Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

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Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

Postby NZcaver » Feb 25, 2012 12:18 am

Saw this tonight on Animal Planet. Family moves into house, and finds bats living in the attic. They hire exterminators who give them the bad news that their house guests are protected Little Browns which they can't eradicate or evict while they are roosting with pups. The landlord visits, and apparently thinks sealing up the attic during the day will fix the problem. Come dusk, the bats can't get out so they invade the house and terrorize the family. Family barricade themselves in a bedroom, but when the boy makes a dash for the bathroom a bat manages to attack and bite his neck. Exciting stuff. :roll:

A brief clip from the show's 'expert' - Dr Patricia DeLaMora - only serves to inform everybody that "bats are the most common cause of rabies in the US." Unfortunately the show is all about shock value rather than actual education.

http://animal.discovery.com/videos/infe ... r-old.html
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Re: Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

Postby Cheryl Jones » Feb 25, 2012 7:17 pm

It seems Dr Patricia gives bats an unfair rap: :down:

The CDC says
Wild animals accounted for 92% of reported cases of rabies in 2010. Raccoons continued to be the most frequently reported rabid wildlife species(36.5% of all animal cases during 2010), followed by skunks (23.5%), bats (23.2%), foxes (7.0%), and other wild animals, including rodents and lagomorphs (1.8%). Reported cases decreased among all wild animals during 2010.

http://www.cdc.gov/rabies/location/usa/ ... imals.html

And this isn't new:
Wild Animals With Rabies: Wild animals accounted for 93 percent of reported cases of rabies in 2001. The wild animals in which infection was reported included:

Raccoons -- 37.2 percent of all animal cases during 2001
Skunks -- 30.7 percent
Bats -- 17.2 percent
Foxes -- 5.9 percent
Other wild animals, including rodents and lagomorphs (e.g., rabbits and hares) -- 0.7 percent.

http://rabies.emedtv.com/rabies/animals ... abies.html

This is interesting from the CDC:
The number of rabies-related human deaths in the United States has declined from more than 100 annually at the turn of the century to one or two per year in the 1990's. Modern day prophylaxis has proven nearly 100% successful.

In the United States, human fatalities associated with rabies occur in people who fail to seek medical assistance, usually because they were unaware of their exposure.

http://www.cdc.gov/rabies/location/usa/index.html

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Re: Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

Postby aaarg » Feb 27, 2012 1:36 pm

That's awful. I can't believe a television network with "Animal" in the name would be so ignorant of animals. Potentially millions of bats are dying out and nobody knows/cares and Animal Planet is going to air this sensational anti-bat garbage? Get a clue.

One of many reasons I turned off my idiot-box years ago. "Educational" programming.
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Re: Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

Postby Tito the Turtle » Mar 7, 2012 6:05 pm

Animal Planet has gone down hill in the education department. They focus on reality tv and sensational type shows. Useless pap.
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Re: Animal Planet: Infested! Bat Attacks Four Year Old

Postby caverdan » Mar 7, 2012 7:01 pm

Kind of along the same lines. Shows how not all bats roost in caves. :argue:

http://www.videobash.com/video_show/bat ... ion-238379
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