RI, MA EHS Pest Control Blog

Rocker Gets Rabies Shots After Bat Urinates in His Eye

What is it about bats and heavy-metal musicians? Ozzy Osbourne famously interacted with a bat in another way back in 1982, but now a member of heavy metal band Torche is wishing he never came in contact with one of the winged creatures.

“Ok so... A bat peed in my eye,” guitarist Andrew Elstner wrote onhis Facebook page March 29. “Whether or not you think I'm telling the truth is irrelevant at this point. What I'm worried about now is rabies. A bat. It pissed into my eye. [God] help me.”

The musician was staying at a friend’s house in St. Louis when he discovered a trapped and frightened bat in one of the rooms.

"I switch on the overhead light/ceiling fan combo and what I think at first is a shadow being cast from the spinning fan blades turns out to be a freaking bat,” the musician explained. “It circles the room a few times at light speed, and on one of the turns, dive bombs my head and squirts a little nervous pee into my eye. Holy [expletive]. I'm laughing but run to the sink and attempt to flush my eye out. I'm pretty sure I'm fine but...Not the most common of occurrences.”

Elstner initially brushed it off, but, at the recommendation of both his parents and doctors, the musician went to the hospital to be treated a day later.

He added, “With rabies, you have a short window to get treated, and beyond that, it is incurable and 100% fatal. Having said all that, I feel like I'm getting treated for a unicorn bite. Bunch of nonsense.”

Elstner told msnbc.com that his treatment "wasn't so bad." "I had five (shots) totally and while I'm generally terrified of needles, the nurse was pretty attractive so that helped."

The guitarist, whose Florida-based band is on the road promoting the April 24 release of their new album, “Harmonicraft,” has since swapped his own Facebook profile photo for that of a fang-baring bat, and has continued to find humor in the situation, posting various updates and coverage of his story to fans.

“The bat peeing in my eye story has finally achieved critical mass,” Elstner wrote Wednesday, when his story was picked up by Pitchfork Media. “What a truly strange, though now harmless, event in my life.”

He told msnbc.com, "I had written that post just for my friends because I thought the story was hilarious."

And for Elstner’s fans and followers, the encounter proved equally amusing.

Wrote Annie Zed, “This pretty much cements your status in metal's immortal brotherhood."

Source = MSNBC Entertainment

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA 

Bat in Box Prompts Rabies Concern, Health Department Says Man Showed Bat to People Last Week

An unusual sight in downtown Providence last week as an unidentified man was in Kennedy Plaza, showing off a bat he had in a box.

It happened around 8:45 in the morning on January 23rd.

"This bat, we don't know if it had rabies or not", says Peter Hanney, Department of Health spokesperson. "So out of an abundance of caution we're asking people to please give us a call at the Department of Health."

Health officials were first alerted to the incident by a health care provider who treated two people who came in contact with the bat.

"Two individuals were treated, one for a bat bite and the other for suspected rabies exposure. They informed the health care provider that they received this from a bat in a box from an individual in Kennedy Plaza," adds Hanney.

Health officials say they're concerned about the incident because five percent of all bats have rabies and bat rabies is extremely contagious.

"There's different types of rabies, and the bat strain is really contagious. It doesn't need to be from a bite. It can be just from the saliva if it gets into any mucous membranes or small cuts that you may have on you, you can contract rabies that way too. left untreated it is deadly," says Hanney.

The unidentified man who originally had the bat in a box is in his 50's, about six feet tall with a beard and he was wearing glasses at the time.

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA