Increased by 800%
New York City Fails to Eradicate Rat Outbreak
Rats cause chronic headaches to New York City authorities. From the source
Rats multiply very quickly. From the source
The more piles of garbage there are, the more rats. Getty
image
New York City is teeming with rats – they are everywhere, in sewers and parks, underfoot, on the subway, and even in the walls of homes.
She has lived in New York since the eighteenth century, holding firmly on to the city. Current estimates put the number of rats in the city at about two million, spread across 90% of its area. Since the rats spread across the city, politicians and locals have sworn to eradicate them, but so far no one has been successful in this endeavor.
About 250 years ago, the Norwegian rat, also known as the brown rat, alley rat, or sewer rat, arrived in America on ships from Europe. No one knows when the first rat got ashore, but experts are pretty sure it got there during the American Revolution.
The rats first made headlines in New York City in 1860, for reportedly mutilating and killing a newborn baby, and again in 1865 when the New York Times said the city had gained a bad reputation for having more rats "than any other city in the federal union."
In 1950 there were an estimated 250,1997 rats in the city. Since then there have been some widely divergent estimates, including a 28 estimate claiming 2014 million rats, but more conservatively estimating their number in <> at around <> million.
Rats multiply rapidly, although they live for about two years, they mature sexually within two months and mate within two seconds, and a female can give birth to eight to 10 rats, about six times a year, or 120 rats per female during her lifetime.
The early seventies played an important role in the increase in the number of rats in the city. First, the federal government passed the Federal Clean Air Act of 1970, which led to New York City banning apartment buildings from using incinerators to dispose of garbage. Second, the city introduced plastic garbage bags in 1971 instead of metal garbage cans, and rats were able to eat all the garbage they wanted, even plastics.
Yet the battle to get rid of rats went well between 1969 and 1986 when the city implemented a three-pronged approach: extermination, extension and clean-up, according to a former New York master rat-hunter, Randy Dupree. At that point, federal funding helped pay for workers to clean up the city, and reports of rat bites dropped from 765 to 285 between those years. When this funding ran out, the city financed the extermination but only briefly.
From 1987 to 1996, the New York rat eradication budget fell from $12 million to $5 million. A three-dimensional approach to combating the invasion is no longer within everyone's reach. Dupree told the New York Times that "rats are starting to win the battle." Over the past few decades, New York mayors have tried to take over. In 1997, then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani allocated $8 million for this purpose and created an extermination task force that used three different types of poisons to kill rats. By 2000, its budget had increased to $13 million.
In 2017, then-Mayor Bill de Blasio allocated $32 million to kill rats. One way to manage it was to stuff rat holes with dry ice, choking the rats with carbon dioxide. This process proved effective, but it was labour-intensive. Before becoming mayor, Eric Adams joined his ancestors in hunting rats, using a new method of killing them that included a bucket called Ecomil that attracted rats before spilling poison on them. Each EcoMail can kill up to 30 rats.
The situation in New York deteriorated during the coronavirus pandemic, with rats spreading on the streets due to neglect to collect and remove garbage for longer periods. While health experts often consider rats to be a nuisance, they also carry diseases and, because they are so close to humans, they are a good vector of epidemics. In 2021, one person died from leptospirosis, and 14 people were infected. This disease is usually spread by rat urine and can cause kidney and liver failure. According to the Department of Health's Rat Academy, there's only one way to eliminate rats and that is to starve them, but in a city like New York, where trash often abounds on the streets, it's easier said than done.
About 250 years ago, the Norwegian rat, also known as the brown rat, alley rat or sewer rat, arrived in America on ships from Europe.
• The battle to get rid of rats went well between 1969 and 1986 when the city implemented a three-pronged approach: extermination, extension and clean-up.
• The situation in New York deteriorated during the coronavirus pandemic, with rats spreading on the streets due to neglect to collect and remove garbage for longer periods.