When you purchase through link on our site , we may make an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .
On Easter Sunday , Christians around the world will keep Jesus Christ ’s resurrection , in which he is sound out to have rise up from the dead three days after his excruciation , according to the New Testament .
scriptural miracle aside , the secular world is replete with stories of retrieval from nigh - sealed end . Over the years , hoi polloi have outlive everything from brain - eating amoeba to coma , and lived to tell the tale .
Stained glass at St John the Baptist’s Anglican Church, Ashfield, New South Wales. Photo credit: Toby Hudson
Here , we bring you true story of some of the most unlikely resurrections in medical account . [ The 10 Most Controversial miracle ]
Coma
Hollywood film make it seem like comas are nothing more than a light sopor , but the realism is , a person does n’t always awaken from acoma , which is defined as a state of deep unconsciousness that persists for an indefinite catamenia of time . But in rare shell , the great unwashed have been known to rouse from coma states even after many years .
A charwoman make Patricia White Bull entered a case of coma called a tenacious vegetative state — in which the patient is alive but not responsive — while feed nativity to her son , theLA Timesreported . White Bull lay in a near - comatoseness for 16 years , when one day in 1999 , as a nursemaid was rearranging her blankets , she reportedly baby-sit up and said , " Do n’t do that ! " Other coma case of severely brain - damaged patient have been reported , but in most of these , affected role either wake up within a few Day or weeks , or stay in a coma state for the rest of their lives .
Shot in head
Few hurt can be as at once fatal as being shot in the header . But on occasion , citizenry have been known to outlive the brutal psychic trauma of a heater to the brain .
In January 2011 , U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was tear in the head in an patent assassination attempt , during a shooting that left six other people dead . Giffords was in critical condition . Doctors removed part of her skull during surgery to keep damage from mind swelling , and placed her in amedically induce coma , allot toCNN .
The bullet passed through Giffords ' skull front - to - back , cause less scathe than a shot passing from one hemisphere to the other would have done . Giffords recovered , but she still has difficulty speaking and walking and her correct arm is paralyse .
madness
Everyone ’s intimate with the image of a fanatic dog , mouth frothing and quick to deliver a fatal raciness . The rabies computer virus attacks the primal flighty system , causing encephalon disease and demise within days of the attack of symptom .
commonly transmitted to human beings by bites from wild animals such as raccoon , skunks , bats and George Fox , the lyssa disease is preventable if treated by vaccination before symptom begin . But after symptoms occur , survival is rare — there have been fewer than 10 documented case of human survival from madness , and only two of these patient had not received prophylactic drugs , accord to the CDC .
Jeanna Giese is the first person known to have survived rabies without receive a vaccine , Scientific Americanreported . When she was 15 , Giese was infect by a bite from a rabid squash racket in Fond du Lac , Wisc . Doctors put Giese in an induced coma to permit her immune organisation enough time to originate antibodies to the computer virus , and give her antiviral drug . Giese survived and go back most of her cognitive power within a few months . Others have since been treated successfully using the same protocol .
Catatonic province
The1990 film " Awakenings,“starring Robert De Niro and Robin Williams , is the true story of how a doctor revive a group of catatonic patients who survived an cephalitis epidemic in the 1920s .
The motion picture is base on the 1973 memoir by neurologist and author Oliver Sacks , who treated patients who survive a form of cephalitis called encephalitis lethargica . The disease can trigger detain physical and mental responses and lethargy , according to the National Institutes of Health .
pouch administered the then - experimental drug L - Dopa , which increase level of the Einstein chemical substance Intropin and is used to address Parkinson ’s disease . The handling " rouse " many of sack ' patient role from their catatonia , hence the name of the cinema .
psyche - feed amoeba
One of the more miraculous aesculapian recovery in late long time have been from infections with the " brain - eating " amoebaNaegleria fowleri . The parasite , which lives in lovesome bodies of freshwater , enter through the nose and wipe out its room along the nerves to the brain , where it munch aside at nous cells . The infection is almost always fatal , but a few people have survived . [ Infographic : Brain - Eating Amoeba ’s Life Cycle ]
In August 2013 , 12 - twelvemonth - old Kali Hardig of Arkansas became the third person to pull round an contagion of thebrain - corrode amoeba . Hardig contracted the parasite at a water Mungo Park . Doctors gave her a cocktail of antifungal medications that were used to cover two other multitude successfully in 1978 and 2003 , as well as an experimental drug developed for breast malignant neoplastic disease . They also cool down her dead body to prevent brain damage , a routine sometimes used to handle traumatic brain trauma . Hardig find , and is currently attending school .
As far as crucifixion is concerned , it may be potential to survive for a short period of meter ( indeed , some people take part in non - lethal crucifixion as a devotional practice session . ) But that ’s another story .
