A two-year-old girl was bitten by rats while she slept in her bed and had to be transported to a hospital in the city of Bnei Brak on Tuesday, as a rat infestation continues to plague the city.
The girl's family heard her scream and then found her bleeding from rat bites all over her body, the girl's father said. They then hurried to the clinic, where it was decided to hospitalize her immediately.
According to the father, they had warned and alerted the municipality multiple times, but they "simply didn't do anything. We are afraid to return home, the situation has to change. One of the children might die because of this," he warned.
"We are afraid to return home, the situation has to change. One of the children might die because of this."
Father of the injured child
The city of Bnei Brak has suffered an infestation of rats, which has led to multiple incidents of people being bitten by the rodents.
Among recent incidents, a two-year-old was bitten in kindergarten and a four-year-old child was bitten in a playground. Both required emergency medical treatment.
Efforts to fight the plague have failed so far
"A quarter of a million residents of Bnei Brak suffer from a terrible plague of rats and mice that endanger human life and no one cares," said Yaakov Vider, a city council member.
"I call on the Israeli government to declare Bnei Brak a dangerous area and to issue an order obliging the municipality's officials to immediately address the eradication of the plague," Vider added.
"The municipality and Mayor Avraham Rubinstein are working very hard to eliminate the nuisance of the rats and remove this significant hazard in every way," Ynet quoted the municipality's response.
"Today's event only strengthens the urgency of approving the emergency plan that is on the table of the city council. The municipality of Bnei Brak is speeding up the overall activity as shown by, among other things, the increase of the municipal sanitation budget, which has almost doubled and currently stands at NIS 120 million per year, and the replacement of trash cans with trash cans that are sunk into the earth, a huge project that is being carried out all over the city."
The municipality announced a "war" against the problem in March and allocated a considerable budget to the matter, Ynet reported.
In March, Vider warned about the situation in a letter to the Health Minister: "In recent days, a number of children and toddlers have been bitten by rats, and an elderly man who was walking on the road even needed medical attention and was hospitalized as a result of being bitten. After consulting with an expert, it seems that the problem does not exist in cities adjacent to Bnei Brak, so there is no doubt that it is related to the sanitation conditions in the city. Bnei Brak is one of the dirtiest and most neglected cities in Israel. This is a clear danger to the public that really endangers human life."