The bats here are a problem too. Normally they'll quarantine the biting animal before giving you injections, if its possible, which of course it isn't with a bat. I remember as a kid, when we were still in the old "sixteen needles in the stomach" days of treatment, we country children were very wary of bats, you never stood around streetlights and such at night (thats where the bats were, looking for bugs). We didn't care about getting rabies, we were kids, we just didn't want the damn shots!

Not surprised to hear a government health ministry doesn't like to admit to the problem, they do the same type of thing here whenever someone comes down with West Nile Virus. A friend of mine got it from a mosquito bite, even remembered when he got bit, and all he heard from the Health Department was "now you travelled somewhere recently right? You must have? Are you SURE you didn't travel? Somewhere? Anywhere? You COULDN'T have caught this here, now. "

Damn do-gooders!