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The Cause Of Rabies In Poe's Death

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Edgar Allen Poe was a mysterious writer that was famous in the early 1800’s for his horror stories and mystery writings and poems. He died on October 7th, 1849, but his death cause is unknown and a very controversial topic. Two of the main guesses as to what Poe’s cause of death was is alcoholism and rabies. I believe that Poe’s death was caused by rabies because Poe’s symptoms were of rabies when he died, two doctors, Dr. Pollin and Dr. Benedetto, tried disproving his theory but could only do it with false information, and another well known doctor, Dr. Benitez backs up his theory that Poe died of rabies with scientific support that can’t be refuted. Poe’s symptoms that he had before he died were those of rabies. “Rabies victims frequently …show more content…

Benitez backs up his theory of Poe dying of rabies with scientific support that can’t be refuted. Dr. Benitez accounts for the lack of evidence that Poe was bitten by a rabid animal. Since the first symptoms of rabies may appear up to a year after a bite, and since small wounds heal in a few days or weeks (often with no scar), Poe might have been lightly nipped or scratched months earlier, and there would be no bite mark present at the time the symptoms appeared. Also Dr. Henry Wilde said Poe “had all the features of encephalitic rabies,” so the symptoms of encephalitis is also supported in this article (gtd. In “Poe’s Death” 187). Some people will try to disprove this theory saying that the symptoms would occur, and they are right. However it doesn’t have to happen right …show more content…

The alcoholism theory cannot be true because the curator at the Poe museum said that Poe couldn’t touch alcoholism at his older age or he would get very sick. In all, I believe that Poe’s death was caused by rabies because Poe’s symptoms were of rabies when he died, two doctors, Dr. Pollin and Dr. Benedetto, tried disproving his theory but could only do it with false information, and another well known doctor, Dr. Benitez backs up his theory that Poe died of rabies with scientific support that can’t be refuted. At the end of the day though, none of us really know how Poe

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