Local specialists remind residents to watch out for signs of bats, rabies

At the start of the summer, doctors are coming out with urgent new advice for people they say could save lives in the face of an old-fashioned disease that hasn’t gone away.

This is a grim subject, but this is the start of the season when bats become most active and there’s a bigger chance of coming into contact with them and the danger of rabies they can carry.

Doctors say any physical contact at all with a bat is enough of a reason to go and see your health care provider.

In southern Ontario the Niagara Escarpment creates an ideal environment for bats, especially right here in Hamilton.

“With the escarpment and you’ve got the water so the insect populations are there, you’ve got mature forests so it is quite a hub,” said Brandon Crawford, a sales manager at Skedaddle Wildlife.

There are also lots of brick homes where bats can sneak in through a crack.

Bats are important for insect control, but they’re also a main carrier of rabies.

READ MORE: Doctors detail 2024 Ontario child rabies death, warn public about contact with bats

Experts say rabies is just about 100 per cent fatal in humans unless it’s treated before symptoms appear.

The doctors writing in the Canadian Medical Association Journal say if a bat touches your skin, it’s time to get help.

“Any contact with a bat is considered a high risk for rabies exposure, any direct human contact,” said Dr. Brian Hummel, an assistant professor of Pediatrics at McMaster University.

This warning from doctors follows the death of a boy in Brantford from rabies after contact with a bat.”

The child was 11-years-old and was at a cottage a couple of years ago, when he woke up with a bat on his skin.

He wasn’t aware of any bites or scratches, but came down with rabies and passed away, which led to this warning from doctors who studied the case.

“If the bat has landed and touched your skin, because of how prevalent rabies can be in bats, any contact with any bat, regardless of how it’s behaving — if you have a direct physical contact with bat of any nature — that constitutes a high risk, that constitutes reason to go to your health care provider promptly,” said Dr. Hummel.

READ MORE: Grand Erie Public Health warns of rabies-positive bat in Haldimand-Norfolk

He says if you wait for symptoms it’s too late, but getting the anti-rabies vaccines before symptoms appear is about 100 per cent effective in preventing rabies from bats.

“They’ve got very small sharp teeth and it’s not always evident — if you get bit, you might not even know it, especially if you’re sleeping in the middle of the night,” said Crawford.

With bats active over the summer wildlife control expert Crawford says the bats you’ll likely encounter are big brown bats.

They’re not aggressive, but they can carry the deadly illness and can turn up unexpectedly.

“People are just sitting there, they’re sitting on their couch watching TV and a bat just flies through the living room or they wake up in the middle of the night and there’s a bat flying around in the bedroom,” said Crawford. “That’s typically how people find out they have a bat problem.”

People could also see bat droppings, which they thought were mouse droppings, a part of a steady increase in the number of bats in the region.

Crawford says if you find them at home, it’s time to get help.

Doctors say human rabies is exceedingly rare in Canada, with only 28 cases reported in people since 1924, but at the same time, rabies has a fatality rate of almost 100 per cent if it’s not treated early.

READ MORE: Hamilton Public Health confirms first two cases of rabies in bats for 2026