[jeff_vader]

My father got it after an injured looking/unusually behaving cat scratched him up. Cat ran away - so it was impossible to test for rabies. 4 shoulder injections - no drama, no noticeable side effects other than maybe sore shoulder.

[more_corn]

Test for rabies can only be done by dissecting the brain by the way.

[jjtheblunt]

False, but it's the cheap way.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabies#Diagnosis

[alexey-salmin]

I remember reading that these tests only worked like 40% of the time in cases that later proved to be positive posthumously.

Tests for viruses usually either measure the immune response (which rabies doesn't trigger) or try to catch the virus RNA/DNA in a sample, but that requires the virus to be present in that specific sample. Rabies is extremely stealthy, it's not necessarily present in either urine or saliva, so these tests effectively are either "positive" or "unknown". Even if you take sample of nerve tissue you may not hit the infected piece because it spreads very slowly and non-uniformly.

[benlivengood]

"The diagnosis can also be made from saliva, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid samples, but this is not as sensitive or reliable as brain samples."