In Johannesburg, South Africa, a three-month-old girl was bitten alive and partially eaten by a giant rat. The child was left alone overnight when her mother took her twin brother with her and went with him to the party. British newspaper Daily Mail writes about it.
The girl was lying on the bed when her mother left. When the mother returned home, she was horrified to find the bloody remains of her daughter. The girl's death was painful, the one who attacked her severely bit her body, ate all her fingers, tongue, eyes …
At the moment, the girl's mother has been arrested and charged with leaving the child unattended. The fact that it was a giant rat (or several giant rats) attacked the child was found out by the traces of the teeth.
The woman's neighbors are shocked and demand that she be severely punished.
In Africa, there are huge, so-called Gambian hamster rats (Cricetomys gambianus). The Gambian rat is one of the largest representatives of the mouse-like species. It grows up to 90 centimeters in length, including the tail, while the tail is about half the length of the body. The weight of an adult Gambian rat ranges from 1 to 1.4 kg.
In South Africa, several deaths were previously recorded when large rats attacked people. In 2011, a rat or rats attacked a three-year-old child in Cape Town and killed him by chewing on his face. The same fate befell a baby from a shack in Soweto (outskirts of Johannesburg). A 77-year-old woman was attacked by rats while she was sleeping and gnawed at her face. The woman died.