Tipsheet
Premium

AccuWeather's Cheap Shot at a Sick Child

Amy Curtis
Amy Curtis  |  July 06, 2026 3:00 PM

There are few diseases that terrify me, a licensed nurse. Ebola is one of them, and the rabies virus is another. Rabies is a horrible way to die, and treatment after being bitten by a rabies-infected animal is paramount. 

Once symptoms of rabies, which include fever, tingling/pain at the bite site, confusion, trouble swallowing, agitation, and hydrophobia (a fear of water), appear, the disease is almost always fatal. Rabies kills by invading and destroying the central nervous system, particularly the brain and brainstem. The brainstem controls functions like heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing. Most rabies victims die of respiratory failure or cardiac arrest.

In 2004, 15-year-old Wisconsin girl Jenna Giese was bitten by a bat at her Fond du Lac church. The bite was small, so Giese did not seek treatment for rabies. A little over a month later, Giese developed symptoms including fever, fatigue, nausea, and difficulty speaking and walking. She was subsequently diagnosed with rabies.

As I pointed out, when rabies progresses to symptomatic, it's almost always fatal. Giese went to Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, where doctors attempted to save Geise's life. They put her in a medically-induced coma, administered antiviral medications, and provided support so her immune system could fight the disease.

That treatment is now known as the Milwaukee Protocol, and Geise survived. However, the Milwaukee Protocol has not been successfully repeated in the last two decades.

Now, with all of that background, we return to the story at hand. I use the AccuWeather app to get alerts and forecasts. But I received a push notification yesterday about another Wisconsin girl who was treated for rabies after being bitten by a bat.

Cecilia 'Cece' Kale was playing outside her Tigerton, Wisconsin, home when the bat bit her left thigh. Her brothers killed the bat and Kale was treated with the rabies vaccine within 48 hours of the bite.

But here's how AccuWeather framed the story (emphasis added):

Cecilia “Cece” Kale was playing in front of her home in Tigerton, Wisconsin, when a bat bit her left thigh, NBC News reported. Kale’s brothers, Nicklas, 11, and Camden, 16, rushed to help her, killing the bat with a homemade sword. 

Kale received the lifesaving vaccine for the rabies virus less than 48 hours after the attack. Her family, which has publicly opposed vaccine mandates, agreed to the shots, as rabies can be fatal if not treated immediately. 

The Shawano-Menominee Counties Health Department confirmed the bat tested positive for rabies last Thursday in a report, marking the first confirmed case of rabies in a bat in Shawano County this year. While the department notes it is not uncommon to have at least one rabid bat per year, it serves as a reminder that rabies is present in the county’s wildlife. 

Cece’s mother, Elizabeth Kale, told NBC her daughter still enjoys playing outside, does not appear to be traumatized by the attack and is currently recovering.

I took a screenshot in case they stealth-edit the story down the road.

Excuse me?

What do vaccine mandates, or the family's view on them, have to do with the treatment Kale received? For starters, you cannot get a prophylactic vaccine for rabies. It's not like the flu, chickenpox, or mumps. You can only get the vaccine after you've been bitten to treat the virus acutely.

And there's a difference between state-issued vaccine mandates and a vaccine meant to save the life of a child from a fatal disease. It takes a despicable person to kick a family who just went through one of the most harrowing experiences of their lives.

Cece could have died, and I'm sure her parents and siblings were terrified. AccuWeather didn't care about that and instead smeared the family as anti-vaccine hypocrites.

It was a shameful, cheap shot.

One can oppose vaccine mandates and still be pro-vaccine. My three sons are all vaccinated, and were as children. They did not get the COVID vaccine, and that was a decision their father and I came to during the pandemic. But I oppose vaccine mandates. It's anti-liberty and anti-parental rights.

Does that mean I agree with parents who don't vaccinate their children? No. I vehemently disagree with them. But I also respect their decision and understand — with the uncertainty surrounding vaccines and autism or other adverse reactions — why they would choose not to vaccinate or delay.

I received blowback for opposing the COVID vaccine, of which I got one round back in early 2021. In fact, Leftist trolls tried reporting my opposition to the state of Wisconsin in an effort to strip me of my nursing license. And I get blowback for not getting the COVID vaccine for my sons, who were 13, 10, and 6 at the time.

But I have no regrets. I looked at the evidence — my sons were low-risk from the disease and low-risk for spreading it — and made the decision that was best for us.

What happened to 'my body, my choice'?

AccuWeather owes the Kale family an apology and a retraction. There was no reason to add their opposition to vaccine mandates to the story about their daughter contracting rabies. It was shameful, and on par for the media, which has politicized everything, including saving the life of a six-year-old child.