Squirrel Leprosy Is Not Their First Attack Against Humans

One of the latest headlines about squirrels concerns how they are infected with leprosy, but this is not the first time that squirrels have terrorized human beings.

Nature World News reports on November 12 that red squirrels on the British Isles were reportedly infected with leprosy. About the situation, a research team from the University of Edinburgh conducted several tests and concluded the red squirrels were, in fact, leprosy carriers.

Naturally, the shenanigans of squirrels are not always so bad, and a recent video made by a squirrel that stole a GoPro proves this.

Alternatively, sometimes squirrels do damage as the victim of humans. For instance, in the 1990’s, Kentuckians were getting brain infections that are similar to mad cow disease. About the situation, New York Times reported in 1997 that part of the problem was that people in Kentucky were eating the brains of squirrels because it was considered a delicacy.

In relationship to mad squirrel disease incidents in Kentucky, scientists said at the time that the squirrels were passing on Creutzfeldt–Jakob Syndrome.

On top of giving human beings serious neurological brain damage because the humans eat their brains, squirrels have also been known to test positive for a terrifying disease that killed almost a third of people in Europe in the Middle Ages.

According to KDVR, in July 2015, squirrels were tested and found to have bubonic plague. Adding to this, Daily Mail stated that squirrels infected with bubonic plague caused economic damage since major campgrounds were closed in America during tourist season.

Squirrels can also cause fatalities in dogs, and, in 2014, Chicago Tribune stated that there was a bacteria killing dogs that was passed to them by infected squirrels. In this case, squirrels were passing Leptospirosis to dogs in their urine.

Squirrels are also considered to be “cyber enemies,” and Washington Post published an article in 2016 that lists all of the locations of squirrel cyber attacks in America. Altogether, since 1987, 623 power disruptions have been directly caused by squirrels, and “there were about 137 squirrel-induced power outages in 2015.”

They also quoted The American Public Power Association stating that more disruption to electrical power is caused by squirrels than storms and “squirrels remain the biggest wildlife nemesis because of their sheer numbers and smarts.”

Sadly, squirrels also cause a lot of bike and car accidents. For example, Guardian writes in 2012 that a prominent football/soccer manager said he was almost killed when a squirrel got caught in the spokes of his bicycle tire.

In Canada, a squirrel caused a four-vehicle crash when it ran across two lanes of traffic in British Columbia, according to CTV News. Thankfully, no one was injured in the incident including the squirrel.

Squirrels are also known to cause serious issues by falling out of the sky. According to Telegraph, in December 2012, a squirrel fell from an unknown location and into a moving vehicle. The squirrel cost an estimated $12,000 worth of damage to the vehicle, and the car insurance company said they were not surprised because they had had 112 “animal strike” incidents within a two month period of time.

Squirrels are also known to viciously attack elders. WHAS 11 reported that three seniors were injured in a long-term care facility in Florida on November 4. According to the 911 call, the seniors were begging for help because the squirrel was “jumping on people and biting them and scratching them.”

It is not difficult to believe that squirrels are going on rampages against seniors because they have been known to binge drink. WGNTV reports in July 2015 that a drunk squirrel did $450 worth of damage to a bar, and the owner thought that they had been robbed by a human. According to reports, the owner stated the following.

“I’ve never seen a drunk squirrel before. He was sozzled and looked a bit worse for wear, shall we say.”

Sadly, in the future, squirrels may still see humans as an enemy that needs to be destroyed because squirrel fatalities and cars may be here to stay. Wired reported in 2014 that the new self-driving cars can detect potholes and have other types of fine-tuning, but, for now, the vehicle’s sensors still do not pick up enough information to stop for squirrels.

Finally, if the above information is not enough of a deterrent to look upon squirrels with fear, Mercury News published an article about how feeding squirrels by hand is discouraged.

After a series of squirrel attacks in Northern California in late 2015, wildlife authorities at the Marin Humane Society had a theory that the squirrel lost its natural fear of humans by being hand-fed. About the dangers of hand-feeding squirrels, Alison Hermance, communications manager with WildCare Rehabilitation Center was paraphrased stating the following.

“A squirrel can’t tell the difference between the person who has been hand-feeding it and anyone else. So it runs up to someone, expecting to be fed, and when the person doesn’t respond, it gets frantic ‘and it ends up with biting, which is what squirrels do.'”

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