Bat that bit women did have rabies

The bat that bit two women last week did have rabies, Douglas Hogg, the Minister of Agriculture, said in a Commons written reply last night. The Daubenton's bat was believed to have been blown across the Channel from France or to have come by ship, and there were unlikely to be any other rabid bats in Newhaven, East Sussex, where this one was found. The women were vaccinated as a precaution.

Meanwhile, Peter Thomas, a veterinary manager with the Ministry of Agriculture, told a Corporation of London seminar yesterday that fox rabies could be eliminated in Europe by the end of the century, and while it may remain in bats, there is no evidence the bat virus has ever infected any animals other than humans.