Are attacks on our rats justified?

THE headline in the Dublin People declared “Locals Battle A Plague Of Rats”.

And according to Carol Shortt, Demond Avenue, Dún Laoghaire the rats are “running all over the place ... my boyfriend and other neighbours have killed several over the last few days with shovels and forks but they keep coming”.

Headlines about rats almost always include the word ‘plague’ – ancient folk memories persist for generations. Every culture has its demons. Rattlesnakes and black widow spiders spook Americans, sea-wasps and sharks worry Australians. Our own worst nightmare is the humble rat. Bubonic plague, the dreaded disease of medieval Europe, killed 31,000 Londoners in August 1665. It was caused by a bacterium carried by rat fleas – when the rats die, the fleas move onto people.