A RABID bat has been found on Britain's southern coast, the first case of rabies there since 1922, the Royal Society for the Protection of Animals (RSPCA) said yesterday.
The RSPCA said the bat had been tested, and rabies confirmed, by an Agriculture Ministry laboratory.
The society's chief veterinarian, Mr Bill Swann, said the bat had been found by a woman in Shoreham, Sussex, who was nipped as she picked it up. Another woman was also bitten. However, Mr Swann stressed the animal's teeth had not pierced the skin.
Neither woman is in hospital. They are being treated with a course of injections.
A rabies expert, Dr Karl Nicholson, senior lecturer in infectious diseases at Leicester University, said it was "very rare" for people to be bitten by bats. "The only time people are at potential risk is if someone is foolish enough to pick up a sick bat."
Mr Swann described the species as Dawbenton's Bat, a small insect eating type found throughout Europe, which is known to regularly overfly the English Channel.
Britain has maintained stringent anti rabies legislation, including an obligatory six month quarantine period for all animals brought into the country from mainland Europe.
Several MPs have called for an easing of the quarantine regulations and their replacement by a system of "passports" for cats and dogs, bearing a record of their vaccinations, similar to the system used in Norway and Sweden.
Many Britons, who have been taking European holidays in increasing numbers in recent years, have complained at not being able to take their pets with them.
While the tunnel under the English Channel was being built between Britain and France there were warnings that rabies could spread from mainland Europe via the land link, and engineers building the structure took numerous precautions to prevent rats and other vermin introducing the disease.
Rabies is spread by a virus which attacks the brain, and is normally transmitted via the bite of a diseased animal.
Symptoms include fever, violent spasms, panic, hallucinations and coma leading eventually to death. Although only a handful of cases of rabies occur each year in developed countries, it is a serious killer in the Third World.
In India alone, about 15,000 deaths occur each year from the disease.