DESTRUCTIVE RATS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXX, Issue 5481, 30 September 1929, Page 4

DESTRUCTIVE RATS.

ENGLzIND’S ENORMOUS LOSS. £250,000,000 A YEAR. The member for Wellington Suburbs jokingly referred in Parliament a few days ago to a rat-catehing scheme which cost the City Council ten shillings a rat. Whilst there can be little doubt that this sum was certainly high, the fact remains that rats do considerably more harm than most people imagine (says the Dominion). For instance, at an International rat-catching conference held in Paris two years ago, some strikingly and almost unbelievable figures were quoted to indicate the damage done by this übiquitous rodent. It was shown that in Britain alone damage to the extent of £250,000,000 is done by rats every year. Some idea of this huge sum may be had when it is realised that rats in Great Britain eat up in four years an equivalent of the total war debt owed to the United States. It is estimated that, on the average, one rat will destroy annually produce to the value of ten shillings. Rats in the United States, however, must have .become infected with the “big” habits of their adopted country. Experts maintain that the 150,000,000 odd rats of America do something like £200,000,000 worth of damage every year. The annual loss to France totals up to at least £40,000,000, whilst in Paris alone there are at the very least 10,000,000 rats to be fed every day. Under the circumstances our City Corporation was not making such a bad bargain as was thought at the time. In addition to the capital loss "involved, it has been known for years that rats are connected with the spread of bubonic plague. Tn India alone over a hundred thousand persons are killed in this indirect manner every year.