How Bats Nearly Killed Me

An expert was on Radio Four just now talking about bats and viruses. He said there are an awful lot of bats in the world - and they are harbouring a truly frightening number of coronavirus threats. Covid-19 is just for starters.

Which worries me more than most. Because I am the only person I know who has nearly died directly because of bats. 

Indeed, I am one of the only people I know who was put on a ventilator and kept awake after a lengthy heart operation - all because of bats. The medics had to keep me conscious because they needed me to re-inflate my lungs, which I can sure you was a most unpleasant experience. 

The most unpleasant few days I’ve spent in my 63 years on the planet. Which is why I am in no hurry to ever be on a ventilator again… Or to get anywhere near a bat.

So why do I claim to have been nearly killed by these wild upside down creatures? Or killed by their excrement - would be a more accurate way of putting it. I am probably the only man you will ever meet who has been at death’s door because of bat-poo.

I shall tell the story briefly here and add some photos… Briefly - because it’s getting hot in the loft where I write - and also because it’s a subject I do not like dwelling on much.

So… back in 2007 I went on a press trip to Malaysia. It was all very exciting - and after a few days generally living it up in Kuala Lumpur I joined a group of young journalists to travel north to the very heart of the Malaysian peninsula and an amazing national park called Taman Negara.

It is said to be the oldest and least messed about with rainforest in the world - and it is a marvel it’s still there given all the palm-oil exploitation going on across that country. 

Anyway, we did many wondrous things in that jungle. We hiked and yomped, picnicked and canoed, swam and generally messed around enjoying ourselves immensely in the sweltering heat. 

But one thing we did which I didn’t like much was to go down a bat-cave deep, deep in the rainforest. I didn’t even want to go down the blessed thing - and when we got to the very bottom of this extensive pot-hole we did indeed see loads of bats hanging from the roof and walls. Then our guide wanted us to go on through a tiny little aperture - which was far too small for me to squeeze through. So I turned around and made my way back the way we’d come. Which was a crazy thing to do, because I could very easily have got lost. 

I did take a few tumbles in the darkness and had to crawl out of various tight spots - and when I at last reached daylight I was horrified to find I was covered in bat-poo. There happened to be a waterfall nearby, so I semi-stripped and washed all the horrible stinky stuff off - only to discover I was covered in leeches. 

It took a while to carefully remove them all with an ammonia insect-pen - and then I leaked like a sieve for the rest of the day. Leeches inject you with a de-coagulant so the blood won’t clot - which isn’t good after you popped them all off and you are swimming in a jungle stream full in nibbling fish who want a taste of your blood. 

Apart from leaking the red stuff for a few hours, I thought no more about it. Until about six weeks later when I got some kind of flu at home. But it was no ordinary flu. I lost two stone (almost 13 kilos) in two weeks and eventually, when I realised there was a ring of sweat on the tiles beneath my breakfast stool, decided I’d better go to the doctor.

I hadn’t been for about 20 years, but was scared because I thought I’d got a dose of malaria. Luckily for me I went to see our local GP back then, one Maggie Wilson. And with her brilliance and her experience with cardio-matters, she realised I’d got a thing called endocarditis - which is basically where bacteria go to live inside your heart. 

Not only do these bacterial bugs set up house and home in the m middle of your ticker (I’m told it can look a little bit like broccoli growing on your heart valves) but the wretched stuff begins to eat your heart away. 

Entering Taman Negara National Park by river

So I was rushed to hospital where they immediately were able to verify Maggie’s diagnosis. And, to put my nerves at rest, they told me I was nearly dead - that the white corpuscles in my body were at a record levels and that I should not really be alive. 

To be honest, I didn’t feel that bad. I’ve had worse hang-overs. 

Anyway, it was all very frightening. They put long tubes up your arm and into your heart and then flood the old ticker with the strongest cocktail of antibiotics they think your body can stand. Six times a day. Eventually I had to learn to mix this potentially deadly cocktail for myself — because after two weeks I told them the hospital would definitely kill me before the endocarditis. 

It was only on the last day - after I’d had every test imaginable - that a specialist came to see me and he said: “We have sent your blood off to every school of tropical medicine in the country and to other places, but none of them have been able to say exactly what go into you out there in the rainforest. It was probably something that entered your system when you went swimming in the river. 

“At least you didn’t go into any bat cave - because if you had, we’d definitely know where it came from…”

“But I did!” said I…

And that was that. They settled on bat poo. “The warm excrement in those rain-forest caves probably makes them the most dangerous places on Earth,” said the Doc. “That poo is heaving with bacteria and viruses…”

Great.

So I really did nearly die because of bat poo. The endocarditis did some damage to my mitral valve, which I eventually had replaced in a big operation exactly three years ago. And I sprang another of my leaks during that operation - I don’t know if some pesky leech managed to get in there - but meant I had to be rushed back into the operating theatre and they had to do it all again. So I was out for about 12 hours instead of five or six. Which meant my lungs collapsed. 

And that is why I was on a ventilator - but instead of leaving me out cold and comfortable in a coma, they had to bring me round to get me using my own efforts to get those lungs re-inflated.  

Believe me, they were the worst moments of my life. By far. 

So I am in no hurry to break my self-isolating during this pandemic. I’m not unduly scared of coronavirus - I think I’d be OK (famous last words) because I’m quite fit and pretty tough (as the above will show) and my cardiologist said my little heart adventures would make no difference.

Indeed, some of my friends wonder if I might not be totally immune to any bat-produced virus, given my little history. 

But why rush out when I can be amusing you folk with interesting tales like this? Just don’t ask me to go back down any bat cave. 

Me and bats are finished. I don’t care if I never see or hear of one again…