Hundreds of Brits report swarms of bleeding ‘Covid zombie rats’ invading their homes – Daily Star

Hundreds of terrified Brits have reported seeing swarms of "Covid zombie rats " during lockdown but a pest expert says the truth is rodent populations are starving to death.

The mass closure of restaurants and cafs due to coronavirus has cut off a major food source for urban rats, who typically forage in commercial bins for scraps.

Now they're being forced into residential areas, where reduced bin collections have increased the amount of household waste building up but there isn't enough food for all of them.

Steven Belmain, professor of ecology at the University of Greenwich, says there's "lots of evidence" that rat behaviour has changed over the course of the pandemic.

"People are calling pest control much more because they're seeing more rats moving about in the day time," he told Daily Star Online.

"It might seem like there are more rats but the population is actually starving to death it's just unusual behaviour, not more of them."

He's received many reports that rats are also behaving far more aggressively than normal, hanging around residential gardens even while humans are present.

"Some people are talking about 'Covid zombie rats' which are very frightening looking they're aggressive, often bleeding, fighting each other over food."

But their alarming appearance is easily explained by environmental factors.

Rats are acting more aggressively because they're desperate for food. It's very unusual for rats not to run from humans, but at the moment their hunger seems to be stronger than their sense of danger.

"They haven't actually attacked people but they certainly stand their ground," Professor Belmain said.

"I don't think they would attack humans, but they do defend themselves and it is scary."

Rats may also be looking a little worse for wear bleeding, emaciated or injured - because they're fighting each other over limited food scraps.

Cannibalism has also become widespread among starving rat populations, with many horrified Brits spotting ravenous rodents tucking into one of their own.

"They're not killing each other, rather they're opportunistically eating dead rats," Professor Belmain explained.

Rats in the UK are also eating their own young, which is unusual in urban environments except in extreme circumstances such as a pandemic affecting the food supply.

"It's common for rats to abandon their young when food becomes scarce so they can focus on staying alive themselves, and having more babies later when conditions improve."

Professor Belmain has studied pest populations in many countries across Asia and Africa, where rodents are more omnivorous because food is scarce. Those rats are also happy to live alongside humans so they can better access food.

The lockdown has created the same kind of environment in British towns and cities, with previously well-fed rats forced into unusual behaviours just to survive.

It's not only bad news for them, but also for humans, as greater proximity to rats often means more disease.

"We need to be concerned about the rodent problem in the context of a pandemic, as rats spread many other diseases," Professor Belmain said.

"The cleanest cities, like Hong Kong and Singapore, also tend to have the lowest tolerance for rats and low levels of disease. The Uk is somewhat more nonchalant, although we're not as bad as New York which is the worst."

He said Covid-19 highlights the need to better manage pests something that's increasingly difficult as the UK's rats build up more and more of an immunity to poison.

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Hundreds of Brits report swarms of bleeding 'Covid zombie rats' invading their homes - Daily Star

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