Public Service Announcement re: bats

[resonant]

Apparently nowadays when you find a dead bat in your living space, the public health authorities really want you to bring it in immediately for rabies testing, or refrigerate it until you can do so.

And if, instead, you flung it out on the lawn to decay ... well, the public health authorities want everyone who slept in that house to have a series of rabies shots. On account of bat bites being painless and leaving nearly no visible marks.

At least they don't do the shots in the belly any more. Three on the arms, four on the butt, and three more emergency room visits to come. I don't even like to think about how much this is going to cost.

So fridge that bat, friends. You'll be glad you did.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

My deepest sympathies. Wish I could steal that bat back and smuggle it to the lab.

[monanotlisa]

Oh, Jesus. I will refrigerate every bat I come across now!

[spikedluv]

Oh geeze! Thanks for the heads up! And good luck with the rest of those shots? o_O

[sapote]

Hey, I'm glad they're vaccinating you, though!

I once had to send a perfectly healthy bat to the lab :( It was asleep in my yarn box when I found it again after I woke up with it flapping around my face. Poor wee bat. But man, I did not want rabies! And it's apparently very true that bats are sneaky biters and you don't know when they've done it.

[oracne]

Owwwww. But yay, not dying of rabies.

[akacat]

Ugh, that really sucks!

I'm afraid that if a bat managed to get into my house, I might never know it had been there. I happened to see my cats chasing a moth this morning, by the time they were done there was no evidence of the chase or their victim.

[blnchflr]

I lived in a house that had bats at one time - it never occured to me or anyone that this was a problem O_o - eh, I would have gotten sick by now if I'd been bit/it was sick.

[saraht]

Yikes!