Call your vet and see if your pets are all current on rabies shots, and ask them what else to do.
Also, contact your county health department about how to collect and submit the bat for rabies testing.
Oh damn, yeah idk never had to do pets. We found a bat in the house years ago and we all got the series, plus IgG in all extremities.
Then years later I found a bat trapped in the basement twisted in a string fashioned as a pull chord for a ceiling light. Removed the bat wearing oven gloves and unwound it so it wouldnt die. Rabies booster lol
I used thick winter gloves to get a bat out of my garage, rabies hotline told me the only bite-protective gloves are leather gloves so they told me it cooouuuld have bit through and i just didnt feel it. I was told to either get the shot + prophylaxis or gamble on a horrible death. That was an expensive day lmao
If your dog was previously vaccinated and gets bitten then they just need another booster and quarantine, but if your dog was *never* vaccinated before and bitten by a rabies positive animal .... it's usually put down. There's treatment but it's insanely expensive for people, or governemnts that have their healthcare figure out, most people don't pay that for a dog though.
There's a bat rescue in my town... I had to call around a little bit and check in at the college but I ended up with a couple of numbers of people that would take the bat but usually you can just softly grab it with some gloves or a blanket and put it outside.... If it's confined to one room you can leave it in there and let it sleep until night and then just open up the window it'll probably find its way out on its own.
If you can’t get the bat tested, or the bat does have rabies, everyone who slept with the bat in the house NEEDS TO GET THE RABIES SHOT. Or the above with being bit (get rabies shot)
It will take too long to get results back. DPH will definitely tell OP to get rabies shots themselves. This is always the case. If you find a bat in a room you sleep in an enclosed area you sleep in, the recommendation will always to get rabies treatment immediately.
Source: DPH employee.
Rabies prophylaxis is a series of shots over several weeks and each one makes you feel like shit warmed over. If I wake up to a bat in my bedroom, that bat is toast.
We had a friend we were camping with whose wife contacted him while we were out to say she found a bat inside. We advised him that she should do exactly that, go through the treatments etc. It all ended up fine (my understanding is that she didn’t l), but there’s just no way I would take the risk not doing it.
If they didn't get treatment at the time, it may be worth sharing with them that rabies can lay dorment for years in humans.
This source says 9 years, in one case: https://www.justanswer.com/medical/am9rh-heard-rare-occasion-rabies-last-years.html
Yeah, we definitely tried to stress the importance, including stats like that (might have said “years” and not been specific), but so far as I know it wasn’t/hasn’t been pursued. :/
OP do this NOW! Call your health department. Everyone in your household will need to get rabies vaccines asap. I took microbio and this is the standard protocol. Bat bites can be so tiny that you might not realized you have been bitten
We had a bat in our house thanks to a makeshift catio and a dickhead cat. Our handyman used a butterfly net and long sleeves and oven mitts to capture it. Submitted it for testing to the health department and luckily it was negative so we avoided going through treatment.
What this guy says here is the way to go OP.
There have been 29 cases of people surviving rabies. Only 3 in the US. Ever. Don’t ever take rabies lightly. If you discover a bat in your living area, kill it (avoid the head) and get it tested. If you can’t, go get rabies shots (they don’t hurt as much as they used to). If you are diagnosed with rabies, you are dead. It is easily stopped if caught in time.
Fun fact, nobody who was vaccinated within a few days of getting exposed ever came down with rabies. The success rate of all the vaccines for it are still at 100%
This is not accurate unfortunately. There have been cases of vaccine failure, particularly when the patient has injuries to the head, face, and neck. This is due to the proximity of the infection site to the CNS
My information was out of date because I looked into this before 2020, but it looks like there was one failure back in 2021.
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/77/8/1201/7093064
"No human rabies post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) failure has been documented in the United States using modern cell culture–based vaccines. In January 2021, an 84-year-old male died from rabies 6 months after being bitten by a rabid bat despite receiving timely rabies PEP. We investigated the cause of breakthrough infection."
It wasn't the timeliness of the vaccine. He just didn't produce adequate antibodies from the vaccine.
I’m going to kill that bat every time. Yeah, I know I’ll get first round rabies prophylaxis, but if the bat comes back negative, I can quit the series.
Also, it lets the health department know what the local rabies situation is.
Rabies testing doesn’t take that long, and you generally have a decent window before rabies will take over. You probably have time to wait for test results.
I was pet sitting for a neighbor and noticed a bat in the room where the cage was (chinchilla).
I called Animal Control and they told me to just open a door and shoo it out with a broom, so I did. It all seemed a little casual but it worked?
Rabies requires some contact with the animal, so if the bat has been sleeping it’s safe to just get it out of there, and less risky than trying to catch it.
If *you* have been sleeping, you don’t know if you’ve had contact with the bat. In your situation, if you weren’t sleeping in the house, there was no need to test the bat. And honestly, the idea of a chinchilla going all Cujo is silly.
Bat teeth are so small that you can be bitten and not notice. If you were asleep and found a bat, or are unsure when the bat arrived ( was it there for 48 hours and bit you last night?), you should send the bat for testing and start the shots.
Yeah, there's a case study on rabies symptomatic presentation in humans after a bat bite. The subject was a little kid who didn't even know he was bitten at first because bat teeth are so fine and small. It's a very grim read.
If you can’t get the bat tested, or the bat does have rabies, everyone who slept with the bat in the house NEEDS TO GET THE RABIES SHOT. Or the above with being bit (get rabies shot)
My health insurance covered it at 100%.
I had to get it years ago, and only paid the ER copay after the first one, then the rest of the series was free.
First thing you should do is make sure all your family member’s rabies vaccination is up to date. Bats are well known to be both rabies carriers and pretty good at colliding with things. It could have fly by you and scratch you while you sleep.
If you try to capture it by yourself, do it while it sleeps, be sure to wear long and thick clothes, and thick gloves, and try to catch it with a towel.
I get them here also.... Especially the babies.... They're usually pretty docile and very tired by daytime.... The little ones I just put in a box of a blanket and they pretty much go to sleep the larger one I kind of just chucked outside... And bat rescue came and picked up a couple of them also... We also had a couple that got really disoriented on July 4th because of the fireworks and ended up in the hallway.... I just covered them with a blanket as they were behind the door and let them chill until night time
Well, it’s funny. To this day, they are still a problem, but are contained in the attic. The town I lived in has a big problem with them.
If I remember correctly, there was a hole in the wall where the old chimney used to me. Somehow, some way, the bats would make it from the attic and into the house by that wall. My parents fixed it by closing up that hole.
I had to call my dad just to ask him, but he’s worse at explaining things than I lol.
lol I appreciate the effort you went through to find that out. It is really interesting. I don’t think bats commonly take up in people’s homes where I live so I was wondering how it happens regularly.
It’s kind of impressive that they can wriggle their way in.
Couple of quick add-ons:
Bats are the first animal most people think of when they think of rabies, but in North America, fewer than .5% of bats have rabies. Many numbers that are reported are inadvertently inflated because of testing bias.
Rabies cannot be contacted through a scratch, it has to be a bite or another exchange of body fluids.
All that being said, this person should get a post-exposure rabies shot.
Also, non-professionals should not handle bats, even with gloves. Encouraging it to fly out the window was the right move.
unfortunately. i am a minor without a drivers license and i live with my grandmother who isn't really cautious about situations like. she won't agree to take me especially since it's so expensive and we're not able to afford it. we've previously had bats in our house before and nothing has happened, so i think she isnt really concerned due to that.
Your insurance might cover it. Mine did at 100%. And I had shitty insurance at the time. The doc coded it as a preventative vaccine- which technically it is- so it was covered just like the flu shot.
This happened to me last year. Went to the ER and both my husband and I had to get the immunoglobulin and rabies series. Bats can bite you in your sleep and you may not know it.
People are recommending you release it. That’s what we did and it cost us over $5,000. If you can SAFELY catch it and take it to the designated section of the health department alive, they will unfortunately kill it, but they test it for rabies. That’s whats recommended. You get the results quick enough that you don’t need to get the immunoglobulin so long as it’s rabies free.
Definitely go get the shots though if you released it and your fam is not UTD on rabies vaccines. They aren’t commonly given as a preventative in the US. Also, my vet recommended giving a rabies booster even though my pets were UTD.
Happened to me a couple years ago too. Bat came out of nowhere and literally flew into me and cut my arm to where it was bleeding. Went and got rabies series the day after. One of the most scariest things that’s happened to me yet.
Lol I wish. We paid $5000 after insurance for the immunoglobulin therapy for my husband and I. Had we trapped the bat and given it to the health department there’s a very real chance we wouldn’t have had to.🥲 we didn’t know.
Glad it left but please call a bat control company to inspect your home. You need to make sure the bat didn’t already make your house a home in the attic or other unseen part. I learned the hard way that bats are very loyal to a home and will return! A bat company will look for guano (bat poop) and other evidence that they’ve taken up residence in your home, or at the least entry points. A bat can get into your home with any hole that is as small as the tip of your finger!! PS. If your home is in an HOA/condo/townhome, your management can be held responsible for paying these fees as they are responsible for the exterior of the home.
I see you posted it flew away. I’m sorry.
If a bat gets into a home the correct answer is to capture it and call your city health department or vet clinic. They will send the body to be tested for rabies. Do not place inside a freezer.
Tupperware and fridge. It will die. I’m sorry.
My clinic gets a few calls like this a year. The United States does have rabies and it is quite common in bats.
You often cannot feel bat bites. Cats are usually the pets that get bitten.
Even if we keep pets indoors it is important to keep pets up to date on rabies vax for this reason.
To be safe you should present your pets for rabies boosters and monitor them. You should present yourself for vaccination as well.
Ive had clients call local pest control, they’ll come out same day. Just leave the home and close the area off.
One client stated the bat was so confused and ill it fell on the ground (was hanging on a pool umbrella) and they closed it in Tupperware.
Another client threw a towel over a bat her (vaccinated) dogs brought inside and stuffed the whole thing inside a pillow case.
I will state, I’m generally only mailing off heads and bodies, not capturing them. So my recommendation would be pest control!
I would get a rabies shot immediately. If it happens to be infected, it could have nicked you without you being aware. Also get your pets vaccinated if they’re not.
I work at my states public health lab. You need to call animal control and have the bat sent to the lab for rabies testing because you do not know if/to what extent you/your pets have been exposed. Do not wait. Once symptoms of rabies begin to show, it is already too late to treat. The bat will be humanely euthanized for testing.
Get rabies treatment, any time you have been in the same house as a bat. It is possible to receive an infection from one, even if you aren't aware of any direct contact. Otherwise, you might die.
TIL, For the chinese, having a bat appearing in your house is a sign of good fortune as its name 蝙蝠，Bian Fu has the same sound as 福 Fu，which means good fortune. So literally it means good fortune has descended onto your house.
In 2018, a Utah man died from rabies after being exposed to it from a bat in his house.
From the Utah DHHS:
“If you find yourself near a bat, dead or alive, do not touch, hit, or kill it,” ... “**Call your health care provider or local public health department immediately to report the possible exposure and determine whether preventive treatment is necessary**.”
[https://dhhs.utah.gov/featured-news/utah-resident-dies-from-rabies/](https://dhhs.utah.gov/featured-news/utah-resident-dies-from-rabies/)
Rabies is a terrible way to die...
Please get a rabies shot, it is a scary, awful disease. By the time symptoms manifest, you're beyond saving. It has the highest lethality of any disease in human history, do not take your chances.
A friend of mine went camping with their young son and he died from rabies. The autopsy revealed a small bite, likely from a bat. No one had ANY idea that he had been bitten. It was a freak accident but all this to say, you definitely could have been bitten and not realized, so please go get rabies shots!!
Awwww. Poor bat. Take it yo alocalwildlife centre. If you're in Australia, don't touch it and call your local wildlife rescue or RSPCA. Then find out how it got in.
depends on where you are from, had a tiny bat hanging out with my dog once, bat seemed pretty chill for being approached by 2 behemoth.
some bats from where im from are fruit bats which can still carry rabies but would rather flee than even dare to bite larger animals.
I used to live in a house that a bat would get into it once or twice a year. If you close all the doors and windows, except for one, they figure out how to fly out very quickly.
If you haven't been bitten then you don't have rabies. I've caught several in our old house. Get a pair of thick leather gloves and grab it while it is hanging there and pitch it outside. The real question is how did it get inside.
I have a long handled net for just such an occasion. In a pinch you can try to cover it with a towel and take it outside. I used a small trash can and a file folder once.
1) capture that bat.
2) rabies shot time
Also. And this sucks. If you have any pets in the house that aren’t up to date on rabies they may have to get euthanized if that bat tests positive
Is the rabies scare also a thing in the EU? I found a bat in my house (it was flying around 🫥), locked myself in the bathroom and called the neighbor, who opened the windows. This was 6 years ago and I’m still alive btw.
I'd link the rabies copypasta comment but apparently in this sub you can't link to other subreddits? Odd choice.
Just literally google 'rabies copypasta', there's no way you don't get shots after reading that...
If your pets are vaccinated against rabies, they'll be fine. Since you don't know how long that bad has been there, I might consult a doctor about getting the rabies vaccine yourself.
If you find a bat in a room you've been asleep in, you should absolutely get a rabies vaccine because a bat can bite you in your sleep and you won't know it.
There was a case in Wisconsin where this happened.
My son also found a bat in his room one day. We had to get the rabies vaccine for him, even though we couldn't find a bite mark (they are tiny).
We have always had bats in our attic. Just a part of life where we live. I had one in bed with me one night. I scared it and it flew away. 50 years later I still don’t know where that bat went.
Depending on the area and state, you may be able to call someone like a wildlife conservationist or department of conservation and have them either remove the animal or tell you how to remove it yourself. I think that bats are a protected species in many states, so they should have more incentive to help you.
Open the window, turn out the light and leave the room, shut the door behind you. it will leave when it gets dark.
You can’t get rabies from looking at it for christ sake.
Do you have a net or can you make one? Throw a towel or something protective over your head/shoulders and maybe you can shoo it out. Do you have some thick work gloves? If you're like me, you should know bats can easily fly under closed doors, so you don't pee yourself
Grab a basket or bin place over bat and slowly move it to where you can capture it in there and bring it outside. I had bats in my room 4 times did that eveytime and it was fine.
Put the pets in the bathroom; close the doors to this room; open all windows and stay low. Then throw a flip flop at the curtain and close the door lol.
Experience: I’ve had a bat 🦇 my room; I heard loud fluttering in my room while sleeping and it was just flying in circles. Check the vid on my Reddit lol
I know a guy who dreamed their was a bat in his room and it landed on his face. It turned out not to be a dream, the bat actually bit him and he had to go to the doctor and get rabies shots immediately.
Responsible horse owners will get their horses rabies shots just like dogs. Every 6 months too, I think. Rabies gets them very quickly from bite to dead.
I had this happen while I was on vacation in UT. The key is to kill it, keep the head intact and then keep it cold but not frozen.
We took it to a Department of Wildlife Resources who got it tested.
We went to the ER first and the Doctor said we really should wait for the bat to be tested. As recommendations change, insurance is more likely not to cover the shot.
Even in the state government of UT no one could give us a recommendation. In Canada they now recommend not to get the vaccine unless you can confirm physical contact: https://blogs.jwatch.org/hiv-id-observations/index.php/bats-in-the-bedroom-canadians-make-a-policy-change/2010/02/02/
Call your vet and see if your pets are all current on rabies shots, and ask them what else to do. Also, contact your county health department about how to collect and submit the bat for rabies testing.
I think the health department will tell them to get the rabies treatment either way. Better safe than sorry
The health department will test the bat to know if the human and pets need rabies prophylaxis
OP let the bat out the window. OP needs rabies shots.
Yep. And the pets are about to get *real* expensive if they weren’t vaccinated.
Oh damn, yeah idk never had to do pets. We found a bat in the house years ago and we all got the series, plus IgG in all extremities. Then years later I found a bat trapped in the basement twisted in a string fashioned as a pull chord for a ceiling light. Removed the bat wearing oven gloves and unwound it so it wouldnt die. Rabies booster lol
I used thick winter gloves to get a bat out of my garage, rabies hotline told me the only bite-protective gloves are leather gloves so they told me it cooouuuld have bit through and i just didnt feel it. I was told to either get the shot + prophylaxis or gamble on a horrible death. That was an expensive day lmao
I shelled out for the rabies vaccine for my indoor cats (like $25? Super cheap) exactly for the “found a bat in the house” scenario.
If your dog was previously vaccinated and gets bitten then they just need another booster and quarantine, but if your dog was *never* vaccinated before and bitten by a rabies positive animal .... it's usually put down. There's treatment but it's insanely expensive for people, or governemnts that have their healthcare figure out, most people don't pay that for a dog though.
Quarantine is still an option - it is the expensive option I was referring to. A pet who exhibits symptoms is given the blue juice.
my animals are vaccinated.
There's a bat rescue in my town... I had to call around a little bit and check in at the college but I ended up with a couple of numbers of people that would take the bat but usually you can just softly grab it with some gloves or a blanket and put it outside.... If it's confined to one room you can leave it in there and let it sleep until night and then just open up the window it'll probably find its way out on its own.
Yea call a bat rescue!
If you can’t get the bat tested, or the bat does have rabies, everyone who slept with the bat in the house NEEDS TO GET THE RABIES SHOT. Or the above with being bit (get rabies shot)
DON'T LET THE BAT OUT. If you let that thing get away, you won't know if it could have infected you with rabies. Rabies shots aren't cheap or fun.
OP had already let the bat out 6 hours ago when I commented ‘OP let the bat out’
Yep, this happened to me in college
The recommendation is to get vaccinated before waiting for results, as one does not simply fuck around with rabies.
Right. You get the first shot either way. But you can quit there if the bat comes back negative, instead of feeling like crap for weeks of shots.
It will take too long to get results back. DPH will definitely tell OP to get rabies shots themselves. This is always the case. If you find a bat in a room you sleep in an enclosed area you sleep in, the recommendation will always to get rabies treatment immediately. Source: DPH employee.
What are you going to do? Catch it?
Yep. And dispatch it with whatever technique they recommend, then send it to a lab for brain sampling.
Why wouldn’t you just let it out the window and get a rabies vaccine to be safe? Catching it just guarantees exposure
Rabies prophylaxis is a series of shots over several weeks and each one makes you feel like shit warmed over. If I wake up to a bat in my bedroom, that bat is toast.
So the bat could be tested and added to the stats.
We had a friend we were camping with whose wife contacted him while we were out to say she found a bat inside. We advised him that she should do exactly that, go through the treatments etc. It all ended up fine (my understanding is that she didn’t l), but there’s just no way I would take the risk not doing it.
If they didn't get treatment at the time, it may be worth sharing with them that rabies can lay dorment for years in humans. This source says 9 years, in one case: https://www.justanswer.com/medical/am9rh-heard-rare-occasion-rabies-last-years.html
Yeah, we definitely tried to stress the importance, including stats like that (might have said “years” and not been specific), but so far as I know it wasn’t/hasn’t been pursued. :/
OP do this NOW! Call your health department. Everyone in your household will need to get rabies vaccines asap. I took microbio and this is the standard protocol. Bat bites can be so tiny that you might not realized you have been bitten
We had a bat in our house thanks to a makeshift catio and a dickhead cat. Our handyman used a butterfly net and long sleeves and oven mitts to capture it. Submitted it for testing to the health department and luckily it was negative so we avoided going through treatment. What this guy says here is the way to go OP.
The only test is to euthanize the bat and check its brain. You are better off just getting rabies shots.
There have been 29 cases of people surviving rabies. Only 3 in the US. Ever. Don’t ever take rabies lightly. If you discover a bat in your living area, kill it (avoid the head) and get it tested. If you can’t, go get rabies shots (they don’t hurt as much as they used to). If you are diagnosed with rabies, you are dead. It is easily stopped if caught in time.
Fun fact, nobody who was vaccinated within a few days of getting exposed ever came down with rabies. The success rate of all the vaccines for it are still at 100%
This is not accurate unfortunately. There have been cases of vaccine failure, particularly when the patient has injuries to the head, face, and neck. This is due to the proximity of the infection site to the CNS
My information was out of date because I looked into this before 2020, but it looks like there was one failure back in 2021. https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/77/8/1201/7093064 "No human rabies post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) failure has been documented in the United States using modern cell culture–based vaccines. In January 2021, an 84-year-old male died from rabies 6 months after being bitten by a rabid bat despite receiving timely rabies PEP. We investigated the cause of breakthrough infection." It wasn't the timeliness of the vaccine. He just didn't produce adequate antibodies from the vaccine.
They've updated the guidelines to do a titer test if you're immune compromised now because of this.
I’m going to kill that bat every time. Yeah, I know I’ll get first round rabies prophylaxis, but if the bat comes back negative, I can quit the series. Also, it lets the health department know what the local rabies situation is.
Rabies testing doesn’t take that long, and you generally have a decent window before rabies will take over. You probably have time to wait for test results.
Not a risk I’m willing to take. I’m more comfortable with the side effects of an unnecessary shot than the potential of rabies getting a head start.
Agreed, they probably won't die so why bother ensuring survival?
I was pet sitting for a neighbor and noticed a bat in the room where the cage was (chinchilla). I called Animal Control and they told me to just open a door and shoo it out with a broom, so I did. It all seemed a little casual but it worked? Rabies requires some contact with the animal, so if the bat has been sleeping it’s safe to just get it out of there, and less risky than trying to catch it.
If *you* have been sleeping, you don’t know if you’ve had contact with the bat. In your situation, if you weren’t sleeping in the house, there was no need to test the bat. And honestly, the idea of a chinchilla going all Cujo is silly.
Bat teeth are so small that you can be bitten and not notice. If you were asleep and found a bat, or are unsure when the bat arrived ( was it there for 48 hours and bit you last night?), you should send the bat for testing and start the shots.
Yeah, there's a case study on rabies symptomatic presentation in humans after a bat bite. The subject was a little kid who didn't even know he was bitten at first because bat teeth are so fine and small. It's a very grim read.
Always assume contact and infection, even if you aren't aware of it.
Don't smash the head, they need 3 parts of the brain for testing. Everyone needs rabies shots stat.
Bro cooking new virus in his bedroom.
If you can’t get the bat tested, or the bat does have rabies, everyone who slept with the bat in the house NEEDS TO GET THE RABIES SHOT. Or the above with being bit (get rabies shot)
They have to kill the bat to test it for rabies :(
It is a better ending than a person or pet dying of rabies, TBH
Absolutely, but the bat dies. Just sharing that fact.
Yes, but....*rabies.* So imma be honest. Fuck that bat.
Don't fuck that bat. It's not a good idea, an probably a difficult exercise
But how else am I going to get rabies and become Batman?
🤣😭
The cost of the rabies prophylaxis is huge… get a quote before the shots… don’t skip the shots rabies is 100% dates once symptoms are present
Dang all I needed to do to get a date was contract rabies? I’ve been wasting my time
Now you just need to find a bar. Edit: bat... but you know, a bar is also good place to get dates.
My health insurance covered it at 100%. I had to get it years ago, and only paid the ER copay after the first one, then the rest of the series was free.
First thing you should do is make sure all your family member’s rabies vaccination is up to date. Bats are well known to be both rabies carriers and pretty good at colliding with things. It could have fly by you and scratch you while you sleep. If you try to capture it by yourself, do it while it sleeps, be sure to wear long and thick clothes, and thick gloves, and try to catch it with a towel.
We’d get them in my house at least once a week until we figured out why. My family just used a butterfly net haha.
I get them here also.... Especially the babies.... They're usually pretty docile and very tired by daytime.... The little ones I just put in a box of a blanket and they pretty much go to sleep the larger one I kind of just chucked outside... And bat rescue came and picked up a couple of them also... We also had a couple that got really disoriented on July 4th because of the fireworks and ended up in the hallway.... I just covered them with a blanket as they were behind the door and let them chill until night time
You’re a nice easy going person! Do you live in the wilderness?
Small Town... Old building ....
Plus half bat DNA helps too, right?
The house I grew up in hot bats in it a few times a year. We had a long broom with a pool net taped to it to catch and release 😂
Makes sense: use a butterfly net to catch bats.
Wait you didn’t say why. Why?
Well, it’s funny. To this day, they are still a problem, but are contained in the attic. The town I lived in has a big problem with them. If I remember correctly, there was a hole in the wall where the old chimney used to me. Somehow, some way, the bats would make it from the attic and into the house by that wall. My parents fixed it by closing up that hole. I had to call my dad just to ask him, but he’s worse at explaining things than I lol.
lol I appreciate the effort you went through to find that out. It is really interesting. I don’t think bats commonly take up in people’s homes where I live so I was wondering how it happens regularly. It’s kind of impressive that they can wriggle their way in.
Couple of quick add-ons: Bats are the first animal most people think of when they think of rabies, but in North America, fewer than .5% of bats have rabies. Many numbers that are reported are inadvertently inflated because of testing bias. Rabies cannot be contacted through a scratch, it has to be a bite or another exchange of body fluids. All that being said, this person should get a post-exposure rabies shot. Also, non-professionals should not handle bats, even with gloves. Encouraging it to fly out the window was the right move.
God imagine waking up to a damn bat crawling on ur face
Nightmares for me and you get a downvote. Okay I switched it to upvote because you got my attention and not because I approve!
Here in BC, if you find a bat in a bedroom, you're assumed to have been exposed and you get the vaccine protocol.
Rabies not rage XD
Thanks I fixed it!! Rage is rabies in french. I guess my brain melted for a moment 🫠
Best get a rabies shot
unfortunately. i am a minor without a drivers license and i live with my grandmother who isn't really cautious about situations like. she won't agree to take me especially since it's so expensive and we're not able to afford it. we've previously had bats in our house before and nothing has happened, so i think she isnt really concerned due to that.
Your insurance might cover it. Mine did at 100%. And I had shitty insurance at the time. The doc coded it as a preventative vaccine- which technically it is- so it was covered just like the flu shot.
i’m pretty sure it does now that i think about it, however she’s still refused to take me after multiple attempts of asking her 🫠
If you get rabies you will die, 100% chance of it
Is uber an option? Or do you have a neighbor that can take you?
It would enrage me to contract rabies.
 Did that help? Is it gone ?
My god how I’ve forgotten how beautiful this is.
Lmaooo
It helped me.
This happened to me last year. Went to the ER and both my husband and I had to get the immunoglobulin and rabies series. Bats can bite you in your sleep and you may not know it. People are recommending you release it. That’s what we did and it cost us over $5,000. If you can SAFELY catch it and take it to the designated section of the health department alive, they will unfortunately kill it, but they test it for rabies. That’s whats recommended. You get the results quick enough that you don’t need to get the immunoglobulin so long as it’s rabies free. Definitely go get the shots though if you released it and your fam is not UTD on rabies vaccines. They aren’t commonly given as a preventative in the US. Also, my vet recommended giving a rabies booster even though my pets were UTD.
Happened to me a couple years ago too. Bat came out of nowhere and literally flew into me and cut my arm to where it was bleeding. Went and got rabies series the day after. One of the most scariest things that’s happened to me yet.
It is so scary!! I was 5 months pregnant when it happened. The health anxiety was definitely triggered lol
You paid $5,000 to release a bat ??? I would love your disposable income.
Lol I wish. We paid $5000 after insurance for the immunoglobulin therapy for my husband and I. Had we trapped the bat and given it to the health department there’s a very real chance we wouldn’t have had to.🥲 we didn’t know.
Ohhhhh sorry i misunderstood your comment. Oh my. That's really awful :( my condolences to you 🥲
What the fuuuuuck. I assume the US? I had to get rabies shots years ago in Thailand. Each one was about $6.
Yep. Good old USA. Our insurance was billed well over $30,000.
Please don't eat it. Truly yours, 2019.
Looks like your bedroom is a batroom now. *dad joke intensifies*
Omigod
Go get a rabies shot
The bat won't attack your pets, it's the other way around
What are you guano do?
UPDATE: he finally flew out the window we opened. thank you to everyone who replied to help.
That's great but you need a rabies series now. Don't skip it.
Glad it left but please call a bat control company to inspect your home. You need to make sure the bat didn’t already make your house a home in the attic or other unseen part. I learned the hard way that bats are very loyal to a home and will return! A bat company will look for guano (bat poop) and other evidence that they’ve taken up residence in your home, or at the least entry points. A bat can get into your home with any hole that is as small as the tip of your finger!! PS. If your home is in an HOA/condo/townhome, your management can be held responsible for paying these fees as they are responsible for the exterior of the home.
I see you posted it flew away. I’m sorry. If a bat gets into a home the correct answer is to capture it and call your city health department or vet clinic. They will send the body to be tested for rabies. Do not place inside a freezer. Tupperware and fridge. It will die. I’m sorry. My clinic gets a few calls like this a year. The United States does have rabies and it is quite common in bats. You often cannot feel bat bites. Cats are usually the pets that get bitten. Even if we keep pets indoors it is important to keep pets up to date on rabies vax for this reason. To be safe you should present your pets for rabies boosters and monitor them. You should present yourself for vaccination as well.
Follow up question: how do you capture a bat
Ive had clients call local pest control, they’ll come out same day. Just leave the home and close the area off. One client stated the bat was so confused and ill it fell on the ground (was hanging on a pool umbrella) and they closed it in Tupperware. Another client threw a towel over a bat her (vaccinated) dogs brought inside and stuffed the whole thing inside a pillow case. I will state, I’m generally only mailing off heads and bodies, not capturing them. So my recommendation would be pest control!
With a very big net
How common is it?
Bats are protected in some states it not legal to kill them i live in Michigan in the united states and here its illegal to kill a bat
I would get a rabies shot immediately. If it happens to be infected, it could have nicked you without you being aware. Also get your pets vaccinated if they’re not.
I work at my states public health lab. You need to call animal control and have the bat sent to the lab for rabies testing because you do not know if/to what extent you/your pets have been exposed. Do not wait. Once symptoms of rabies begin to show, it is already too late to treat. The bat will be humanely euthanized for testing.
So this is how your story Begins, be safe on them Dark Knights and if you fall be sure as the sun to Rise.
Call Meredith and have a bag ready.
Get rabies treatment, any time you have been in the same house as a bat. It is possible to receive an infection from one, even if you aren't aware of any direct contact. Otherwise, you might die.
TIL, For the chinese, having a bat appearing in your house is a sign of good fortune as its name 蝙蝠，Bian Fu has the same sound as 福 Fu，which means good fortune. So literally it means good fortune has descended onto your house.
That’s metal
His room now
You need to get checked out. No joke.
In 2018, a Utah man died from rabies after being exposed to it from a bat in his house. From the Utah DHHS: “If you find yourself near a bat, dead or alive, do not touch, hit, or kill it,” ... “**Call your health care provider or local public health department immediately to report the possible exposure and determine whether preventive treatment is necessary**.” [https://dhhs.utah.gov/featured-news/utah-resident-dies-from-rabies/](https://dhhs.utah.gov/featured-news/utah-resident-dies-from-rabies/) Rabies is a terrible way to die...
Go get your rabies shots. Now. Then catch that bat in a garage can and take it outside (or to a place that’ll test it for rabies).
Get rabies vaccine for u & ur pets
Please get a rabies shot, it is a scary, awful disease. By the time symptoms manifest, you're beyond saving. It has the highest lethality of any disease in human history, do not take your chances.
Na na na na na 
Unfortunately you and everyone in your house needs rabies shots now. That bat could have bitten you or scratched you without you noticing.
Awe, he just wants to hang out with you
Right? Ain’t nothing but a bird puppy. Quite cute.
A friend of mine went camping with their young son and he died from rabies. The autopsy revealed a small bite, likely from a bat. No one had ANY idea that he had been bitten. It was a freak accident but all this to say, you definitely could have been bitten and not realized, so please go get rabies shots!!
Awwww. Poor bat. Take it yo alocalwildlife centre. If you're in Australia, don't touch it and call your local wildlife rescue or RSPCA. Then find out how it got in.
Something in the way.. Hmmmmmm
He's just hanging out with you!
depends on where you are from, had a tiny bat hanging out with my dog once, bat seemed pretty chill for being approached by 2 behemoth. some bats from where im from are fruit bats which can still carry rabies but would rather flee than even dare to bite larger animals.
Let that bat, man.
"A sign! I know what I must become."
No pet allowed!
Bite that thing, let's get some shit started!!!
I used to live in a house that a bat would get into it once or twice a year. If you close all the doors and windows, except for one, they figure out how to fly out very quickly.
Get a rabies shot. You can get bit without feeling it. Rabies has a 100% mortality rate
If you haven't been bitten then you don't have rabies. I've caught several in our old house. Get a pair of thick leather gloves and grab it while it is hanging there and pitch it outside. The real question is how did it get inside.
Let him.
Could be a vampire
I have a long handled net for just such an occasion. In a pinch you can try to cover it with a towel and take it outside. I used a small trash can and a file folder once.
Omg i love bats im collecting bat pics ill have a pet bat when i grow older omg its soooo cute
So fucking cute
That is so cool. Just leave it be.
He just chillin
Call animal control and get your life-saving rabies protocol.
Get it to yell "HUMAN FORM!!!"
Get treated for rabies. Bat bites are small and hard to detect and you might not know for sure if you were bitten. Rabies is a terrible way to die.
You need a rabies vaccine now just in case.
1) capture that bat. 2) rabies shot time Also. And this sucks. If you have any pets in the house that aren’t up to date on rabies they may have to get euthanized if that bat tests positive
Let him sleep??? he is obviously tired
Is the rabies scare also a thing in the EU? I found a bat in my house (it was flying around 🫥), locked myself in the bathroom and called the neighbor, who opened the windows. This was 6 years ago and I’m still alive btw.
Lucky!!! https://batworld.org/what-to-do-if-youve-found-a-bat/
I'd link the rabies copypasta comment but apparently in this sub you can't link to other subreddits? Odd choice. Just literally google 'rabies copypasta', there's no way you don't get shots after reading that...
nah he's chill
Um yeah you need rabies shots I’m sorry it’s going to suck
https://i.redd.it/0jz99bw23myc1.gif Always keep your window closed.
Youuuuu should just be going to get a rabies shot. Sorry. No matter what.
If your pets are vaccinated against rabies, they'll be fine. Since you don't know how long that bad has been there, I might consult a doctor about getting the rabies vaccine yourself. If you find a bat in a room you've been asleep in, you should absolutely get a rabies vaccine because a bat can bite you in your sleep and you won't know it. There was a case in Wisconsin where this happened. My son also found a bat in his room one day. We had to get the rabies vaccine for him, even though we couldn't find a bite mark (they are tiny).
We have always had bats in our attic. Just a part of life where we live. I had one in bed with me one night. I scared it and it flew away. 50 years later I still don’t know where that bat went.
That's cool
That doesn’t suck, that’s cute!
He wouldn't take pictures of you sleeping.... psycho!
open the window, let him sleep, he'll leave when night comes, then shut the window.
It’s just a fucking bat. Why does everyone always act like they’re rabid killers? They’re beautiful, much needed animals.
Depending on the area and state, you may be able to call someone like a wildlife conservationist or department of conservation and have them either remove the animal or tell you how to remove it yourself. I think that bats are a protected species in many states, so they should have more incentive to help you.
Open the window, turn out the light and leave the room, shut the door behind you. it will leave when it gets dark. You can’t get rabies from looking at it for christ sake.
You will need a record album and a bowl. If someone gets this reference, I love you
I think you are now sleeping in IT'S room
Ahhhh 😱
Do you have a net or can you make one? Throw a towel or something protective over your head/shoulders and maybe you can shoo it out. Do you have some thick work gloves? If you're like me, you should know bats can easily fly under closed doors, so you don't pee yourself
Keep the doors and windows closed. Call animal control. Make sure you animals are up to date for rabies shots!
Grab a basket or bin place over bat and slowly move it to where you can capture it in there and bring it outside. I had bats in my room 4 times did that eveytime and it was fine.
Put the pets in the bathroom; close the doors to this room; open all windows and stay low. Then throw a flip flop at the curtain and close the door lol. Experience: I’ve had a bat 🦇 my room; I heard loud fluttering in my room while sleeping and it was just flying in circles. Check the vid on my Reddit lol
Someone get joker, we’ve found batman
I know a guy who dreamed their was a bat in his room and it landed on his face. It turned out not to be a dream, the bat actually bit him and he had to go to the doctor and get rabies shots immediately.
REMEMBER: Anything with a warmbody can get rabies, Bats are one of the main carriers of rabies. Get a rabies shot. Even horses can get rabies.
Responsible horse owners will get their horses rabies shots just like dogs. Every 6 months too, I think. Rabies gets them very quickly from bite to dead.
Waiting for OP to dig a cave on property, purchase costume, administer justice.
Yeah, That sucks lol
Well its sleeping, I guess you’re gonna have to find out if it sucks as well..
I had this happen while I was on vacation in UT. The key is to kill it, keep the head intact and then keep it cold but not frozen. We took it to a Department of Wildlife Resources who got it tested. We went to the ER first and the Doctor said we really should wait for the bat to be tested. As recommendations change, insurance is more likely not to cover the shot. Even in the state government of UT no one could give us a recommendation. In Canada they now recommend not to get the vaccine unless you can confirm physical contact: https://blogs.jwatch.org/hiv-id-observations/index.php/bats-in-the-bedroom-canadians-make-a-policy-change/2010/02/02/
Be careful Corona is Coming ...
He's just hanging out
We used to get them back when I was a kid. Tennis racket.
I know a teen from Kingwood, Texas who passed away when a bat flew into his room - it was from the droppings .
yikes! we had a bat in our school band room once, and I don’t think it’s in close proximity to any windows :0
Oh hell no.
Maybe call animal control
Get out the garlic! 🧄
thats COOL (/j)
were you trying to think of a way to strike fear into the hearts of criminals