Two million people live in KL, with eight million rats

There are four rats to every person living in Kuala Lumpur. The city's mayor Ahmad Phesal Talib revealed this yesterday, during a campaign trail to tackle the arising health risk from rats..

The KL City Hall (DBKL) estimates that there are eight million rats living in the country's capital city compared to two million people,Berita Harian reported today.

"If in Australia and New Zealand there are more cows than people, we instead have to face the fact that we have more rats here," the newspaper quotes Ahmad Phesal (left) as saying.

Ahmad Phesal said DBKL has spent RM50,000 on rat catchers alone while millions of ringgit more are needed to fix the city's drainages.

However, the blame for the rodent issue lies squarely on restaurants and hawkers who are carelessly chucking leftover food and cooking oil into back alleys, the drains and rivers.

This was also one reason also why DBKL needed to upgrade popular food haunts, such as those on Lebuh Ampang, Jalan Alor and Medan Pasar, a move that has irked some Malay traders.