Rats could once more plague the nation, if we fail to curb our throwaway habits when it comes to food.

Now, rats are outnumbering humans. Irma Heger investigates

CARELESS junk food lovers are to blame for increasing numbers of rats in Bolton.

More than 265,000 of the rodents gorge on the leftovers of curries and pizzas dropped on the town's streets every day.

Keep Britain Tidy has launched a campaign aimed at the fast food generation, to encourage people to stop dumping left-overs from take-aways, food halls, sandwich bars and stands in the North-west.

The group says rats now outnumber humans -- and that rodent numbers have increased 13 per cent.

Bolton Council's pest control manager, Geoff Evans, agrees the problem is worsening.

The rodents have the potential to cause damage, disease and destruction, but Geoff gave the reassurance that there are seven pest control operators "on the case" to keep numbers down.

Based at Pike Nook Pest Control Depot on High Street, the team baits 16,000 manholes around the town in a preventative sewers programme.

The operators will also come out free of charge to anyone who has spotted a rat.

Geoff believes the increasing number of take-away outlets in the town is to blame for the problem, combined with the fact that a lot of people can not be bothered to find a bin for their rubbish.

Keep Britain Tidy has warned that rats could soon roam our streets as our litter lures them out of the sewers.

So will we see rats on the rampage in the streets of Bolton?

Geoff says: "Hopefully it won't come to that."

He explains that rats are shy creatures, and even his operators hardly ever see a rat -- just the signs of where they have been.

More bins would probably make the situation better, says Geoff.

Rats need a lot of food -- they eat the equivalent of 10 per cent of their own body weight each day.

They also make use of our left-behind boxes and wrappers for their many nests, with one pair able to produce a colony of up to 2,000 rats a year.

Keep Britain Tidy is now showing an advert in Bolton cinemas, featuring rats feasting off fast food and then climbing in to a couple's bed to illustrate how the rodents are now encroaching on our space.

The commercial feeds on people's fears of rats -- because of their association with the Black Death and other infections.

The advert also features rats dining on the kind of feast we leave lying around for them every day and includes captions such as "The more you drop, the more we eat", "the more we eat, the more we breed" and "the more we breed, the closer we get". It ends with the image of a couple sleeping in a bed covered with rats.

Joanne Whitaker, Keep Britain Tidy Regional Director for the North-west, says: "The consumer believes life's too short to care about what they should do with their sandwich wrapper or burger carton and in any case they think the council will always clear it up.

"Meanwhile the rodent population is rising.

"It's now time to change our dirty habits, think a little and bin any left-over food, before we see rats moving in even closer."

As well as aiming to curb the rise of rat infestations and encouraging people to use a rubbish bin, Keep Britain Tidy is to work with the Government on setting up a code of practice for the fast food industry, as well as cracking down on illegal food vendors who fail to provide bins for customers. Among the other reasons cited for the increasing rat population are warmer weather conditions and cutbacks in pest control expenditure.

In a statement from McDonald's, the fast food chain it welcomed the new campaign.

McDonald's is a member of the Fast Food Litter Forum chaired by the Environment Minister Michael Meacher.

The chain's policy is to carry out "litter patrols" -- staff members going out to pick up any litter near the restaurant.

The majority of their packaging also provides the "Put litter in its place" message.

"Litter is unfortunately a social problem caused by a minority of individuals," says a spokesperson.

"We believe that by educating children it will be possible to reverse this careless trend."

PANEL

The average brown rat can jump more than 2ft and squeeze into a half inch opening.

Rats can climb brickwork and guttering, swim through pipes, scamper up U-bends in toilets and get into cavity walls.

Their teeth are harder than aluminium or copper, allowing them to gnaw through these materials.

200 people a year contract Weil's Disease, which can lead to kidney or liver failure and eventually death, caused by an infection carried in the rat's urine.

Rats memorise specific pathways and use the same routes habitually.

They are cautious creatures and if they find food in an exposed area, they will often take it to a safe place to eat.

The rat is the only wild animal SAS soldiers are banned from eating because of risk of disease -- but they are eaten in parts of China, Mexico and Africa.

Rats eat or damage 20 per cent of the world's crops.