DAVID MCRAE earned a tragic place in history this week as the first person in Britain to die of a rabies-like virus for a century. He contracted the virus from a bat. Never popular, these creatures are fast becoming pariahs. As a bat conservationist, McRae would have been horrified to hear that the official conservation agency English Nature has received calls from people wanting to evict bats from their homes.
A knee-jerk reaction against bats is misguided. There is little evidence that the offending pathogen, a European bat lyssavirus, is endemic to Britain, as it is to continental Europe. A government-sponsored survey should reveal the extent of infection next year.
If the virus is endemic, one fear is that bats could feed a reservoir of disease in mammals. But this looks unlikely. Across Europe, researchers have logged only three cases of bat lyssavirus passing to other mammals. All three animals died without passing on the virus, probably because it is poorly adapted to hosts other than bats.
Advertisement
The only danger to people, then, would be from a bite or scratch and the risks of these are tiny. In continental Europe, bat lyssaviruses have killed three people since 1977. Australians also live with a lyssavirus which has killed two people since 1996. Far from suggesting drastic action, the Australian Department of Health and Ageing offers down-to-earth advice. People who handle bats should get a rabies vaccination. People who are bitten should wash the wound thoroughly and see a doctor quickly for a course of shots.