A news report on a rat invasion in Port-of-Spain conjured images of citizens cornered on filthy city streets by mobs of black, glistening rats. Anyone caught in the city when it floods would know that such hair-raising horrors of the imagination aren't all that far from reality. It only takes a 30-minute downpour in Port-of-Spain to trigger a mass exodus of soggy rats fleeing rain-swollen drainage.
The temporary closure of inner city school Rosary Boys' RC, owed to a rat infestation, suggests the problem is more acute than we are typically able to ignore. I was a Rosary boy and I can tell you the sight of rats on the compound back then was no more extraordinary than hordes of pigeons perched like gargoyles all around the buildings, showering you with their droppings every day.
Classes were recently suspended so that poison could be placed on the compound. As solutions go, rat poison is a decidedly one-pronged strategy. There is scientific research questioning its long-term efficacy as a rodent-control measure. I watched a documentary in which scientists were studying rat behaviour to develop effective pest control techniques. In one experiment, they placed a pat of poison-laced peanut butter (apparently rats love peanut butter) on a kitchen floor. Two rats came to investigate, sniffed at it and then warily backed off. The pair eventually returned with a third, shall we say, beh beh lookin' rat whom they prodded into sampling the peanut butter. Scientists observed that these creatures displayed a level caution pointing to considerable intelligence. Rats are also, apparently, devious enough to press gang, what the scientists postulated, was a feeble-minded member of the colony into becoming a taste-tester.
At any rate, poison is believed to eliminate only small percentages of rat colonies. These percentages are quickly replaced through the prolific reproductive patterns of these odious creatures. Poison, on its own, won't do the trick.
Former Port-of-Spain Mayor Louis Lee Sing, plied for comment on the rat invasion, theorised that these big city rats have developed a "sweet tooth." They are gorging themselves on discarded French fries and doubles on the streets instead of getting on the city's diet plan of more nutritious poison pellets.
Rat infestations are a feature of city life in any part of the globe. The extent of the infestation depends entirely on how a society manages the problem. More worrying is the fact that rats are also prevalent in our suburban landscape. I am usually out on the road very early in the morning and, consequently, I often see these denizens of dustbins in cringe-inducing numbers patrolling neighbourhood streets.
Rats feed on our apathy towards cleanliness. If there is an available food source, then there are available rats. It is rare to see garbage bins secure enough to frustrate the most enterprising rats. In many instances, naked garbage bags are simply placed outside the home. Those bags are shredded by scavenging dogs, laying out a smorgasbord for rats.
The principle cause of what looks to be a rat insurrection is our casual relationship with cleanliness. Overflowing dumpsters, wanton littering, unkempt premises; these all create ideal environments for rats to flourish. Keeping a clean scene in our neighbourhoods and urban centres is the best defence against these disease carrying rodents.
The unwelcome company of rats is a man-made environmental problem. The only way to reduce their ranks in our midst (because they can never be truly vanquished) is to modify our behaviours so that the rats modify theirs.
Cleanliness, as you know, begins at home. At one time or another some of you have stumbled onto a rat feeding at your dog's food bowl. Rats appear to remember your dog's feeding schedule and they will usually approach after the dog is finished. If you are running behind time, you may even encounter a rat sitting in front of the empty bowl tapping a finger on an imaginary watch. Cleaning up after your dog following a daily feeding might seem like a nuisance, but the best available research shows that the leptospirosis spread by rats is an even greater nuisance.
If this diligence is applied in a broader approach to sanitation, both at the level of the community and state, any offensive against rats would likely achieve measurable success. There ought to be public education, apprising citizens on the grave dangers posed by rats and standards of sanitation required to create rat-free zones.
It is encouraging that government, prompted by the Zika menace, is proposing a $3,500 "dirty premises fine." The same conditions which promote mosquitoes also favour rats. Laws without enforcement though, are useless. What must follow is sustained action from empowered and adequately resourced departments of both the ministry of health and regional corporations. The threat demands that we wage all-out war against rats around our homes, food outlets and our cities.
Through wilful neglect and intrinsic stinktitude we create our rat infestations. Should we eschew our slack attitudes towards cleanliness and order, rats would find it far more difficult to make a living off our leavings.