Deep in the South American rainforest, a deadly disease was claiming the lives of the Warao people, an indigenous group in Venezuela.

Once victims developed symptoms-headache, fever, fear of water-they were dead within a week. Yet after more than 30 of these deaths, community members were still baffled by the disease's identity.

Though it may sound like the premise of a Michael Crichton novel, this was the reality UC Berkeley professors Charles Briggs and Clara Mantini-Briggs faced upon traveling to the state of Delta Amacuro to lead a community health project in June. Five days into their initial project, indigenous leaders came to the couple to ask for their help in identifying and dealing with the illness.

Briggs, a professor of medical and linguistic anthropology and folklore, and his wife Mantini-Briggs, an assistant professor in the department of demography and a former Venezuelan physician, combined their fields of expertise to deal with the outbreak.

The pair traveled throughout the humid rainforest, speaking with relatives of victims and recording symptoms. What they found was a very similar set of symptoms in victims from the 30 communities they visited.

"They try to eat, and they can't swallow food," said Briggs, who conducted interviews on the trip and is fluent in the Warao language. "And then they can't swallow water, and there's an exaggeration of the gagging response … at that point, they develop a sense of fear to where if they even see water which is offered to them in a glass, they are afraid of the water."

The couple found almost all the victims had been bitten by bats. Upon further investigation near the Orinoco River, Mantini-Briggs recognized that the symptoms matched those of rabies.

But identifying the disease was not enough. Without a vaccine, there was not much the researchers could do.

Although the vaccine is cheap and very effective in the U.S., the indigenous group does not have easy access to it.

"Unfortunately in Venezuela, race tends to be a factor that shapes the quality of health care that you receive," Briggs said.

For the pair, the research was one of the most emotionally taxing endeavours they had faced. The last victim they saw die was a 19-year-old girl whose husband had died of the illness a week before. They stayed with her from when she first developed symptoms until three hours before her death.

"It was the most difficult professional experience I've ever had," Briggs said. "It puts a huge mark on your heart," Mantini-Briggs added.

The couple stayed in the community and slept in hammocks under thatch roofs-exposing themselves to the same risks the Warao faced.

Toward the end of the trip, Mantini-Briggs herself was bitten by a bat in her sleep. Still, she continued working to save the lives of community members despite a possible rabies infection.

"It was a scary moment for me," Mantini-Briggs said. "Fortunately, I'm still alive, and I want to go back and fight for the lives of the people I love."

The researchers took their findings to the government in Caracas, the country's capital. But rather than responding with medical help, officials rejected the possibility of a rabies outbreak and accused the researchers of trying to discredit the government.

Because the outbreak took place during elections, the government sought to dismiss any information that would ruin its image, Briggs said.

"Without ever coming up with an idea as to what the disease might be, they essentially rendered the epidemic invisible," he said.

With no access to the vaccine, the researchers provided what treatment they could. They pressed the government to provide vaccines and mosquito netting, but succeeded only in getting netting for some communities.

Briggs returned to the U.S. a day before fall classes started, saying he had a "sacred obligation" to students. Mantini-Briggs returned the day after.

Both researchers have worked with communities in the delta area for more than 20 years. Their current project-to bring communities together to fight severe health problems-follows their acclaimed research and treatment of the 1990s cholera epidemic.

The couple won the J.I. Staley Prize in anthropology for the book they co-authored on their cholera research, and used the $10,000 prize money, along with royalties from the book, to fund their future projects in the area.

The pair will lecture in Kroeber Hall Nov. 10 to spread awareness about issues of health and medical justice in Venezuela. They will travel back by December and said they plan to resume their health project and use photographs and film footage in order to increase awareness about the rabies outbreak.

"We hope to return as quickly as possible, to see what progress has been made," Briggs said.

Tags: HUMANITARIAN RESEARCH, ANTHROPOLOGY