Does Vietnam have bats 'vampires'?

After the information said, in Peru, biting of bats causes 4 people to die from rabies. Many readers worry: Does Vietnam have vampire bats that suck blood and carry rabies virus?

According to Peruvian Ministry of Health officials, rabid bats attacked 508 Urakusa village people in the Amazon forest in the north of the country, killing four children. The Ministry of Health has sent three medical teams to the area to look for people bitten and vaccinated against rabies.

Bats bite people belonging to animal sucking blood but sometimes they also attack people, especially those with tropical forests and their habitats are destroyed. This bat species is also known as the vampire bat.

In Vietnam, according to MSc Nguyen Truong Son, bat expert of the vertebrate department, Institute of Ecology and Biological Resources, Vietnam currently has more than 100 different bat species but none of them bat blood.

Picture 1 of Does Vietnam have bats 'vampires'?

The reason for not having this bat species can be due to many factors such as distribution area, living conditions, topographic temperature, host prey, different food . Vietnam is a tropical country so there are other environmental conditions. For African countries, bats have been endemic since then.

However, according to Mr. Son, although there are no blood-sucking bats like in African countries, up to now, 3 species of bats have been infected with rabies virus in their mouths.

The virus is similar to the rabies virus found in dog saliva. If you bite people or animals, this virus can attack your body and internal organs, causing people to die.

These 3 species are large horse bats, baby horse bats and Thai horse bats. These are fruit bats distributed in the Mekong Delta. However, because scientists have not studied in depth, there is no exact result of rabies caused by this animal.

Besides, MSc Son also said that some households still often get into the house by bats, even living in houses. However, this bat is just a mosquito bat, its main food is insects and mosquitoes. This mosquito bat rarely bites people, if biting is only a rare phenomenon.

At this time, no cases of bats and rabies have been identified or other diseases.'In case of being bitten by a bat, you should go to a doctor for advice or rabies vaccination in case of a bad case' , MSc Son advised.

According to Prof. Bui Cong Hien, former lecturer of the Department of Biology, University of Natural Sciences (Hanoi National University), to chase bats out of the house should create an unpleasant environment for that species while ensuring environment for family members. The following ways may apply:

Method 1: Close the door, take the bodhi, flavor, burn it in a smoky way in the house. The smell and smoke of bodhi and sae, flavor will make the bat uncomfortable and fly away.

Method 2: Remove the kerosene from the foam or wood and place it on the bat or shelter. The smell of oil makes an annoying bat as well as oil stick to them, causing them to leave.

Method 3: Burn incense near the bat area often come back. Smoke tends to drive bats away from this area. However, these must be done several days in a row to avoid bats coming back after the smell and smoke are gone. At the same time, attention should be paid to the space for proper burning, avoiding burning but the wind blowing away as well as may lead to a risk of fire and explosion.

Update 16 December 2018

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