Comments on: Exchange Transfusions — A Cure for Vampires?

By: swisswiss

swisswiss — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:45:22 +0000

Sadly, this is one condition where we’ll never see fund drives to FIND THE CURE. Resources are better spent on psychotherapeutic treatment and palliative care. A hospice dedicated to vampires would be an interesting solution.

By: Jayunderscorezero

Jayunderscorezero — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 23:43:38 +0000

This seems a lot like the plot of the film Near Dark. The writers of that claim that the transfusion-as-vampirism-cure idea goes back to Stoker, although supposedly even they questioned its likelihood. In a penned but unfilmed alternate ending the "cured" vampire was supposed to revert (explosively so, due to reversion in broad daylight).

By: Bosda Di'Chi

Bosda Di'Chi — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:45:01 +0000

Hmmm…the story ends with the vampire drained of blood by mosquitoes.

Let us hope that prion-based disease cannot be spread by insect vectors.

By: Sean Duggan

Sean Duggan — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 06:37:07 +0000

“A single mutated gene is not produce” probably should be “A single mutated gene does not produce”

Somehow, the full blood transfusion reminds me of the original planned ending of 28 Days Later where the soldiers never show up, the group eventually finds a scientist who worked on the original Rage project, and they cure the father by giving him every drop of the main male protagonist’s blood. This was scrapped in part because they felt that it was far too unlikely that all of the blood could be replaced given a single drop of blood to the eye was all it took to turn the father.

There’s also the possibility that the vampirism somehow accrues with successive generations who inherit the trait in much the same way that polydactyl kittens tend to have one more toe than their parent (documented cases have topped out with somewhere along the lines of 17 toes on each foot, with the hind legs actually having bifurcated to become more than one leg). Thus, the trait might get passed down bit by bit with successive generations becoming more sensitive to the sun and requiring more blood, assuming of course that they get the gene (obviously, accrual is more likely if you make it a dominant gene like polydactyly)