Tenant blames illness on rats
A rat infestation could have caused a pregnant woman to contract encephalitis after a handyman trying to get rid of the rodents ripped down her kitchen ceiling and left it unsealed for months.
The Tenancy Tribunal said the mess could have been behind the case of encephalitis so serious the woman living at the property in Totara Park in south Auckland had to be hospitalised.
Nerina Emery and her husband were awarded $1500 in exemplary damages and $2000 for their loss of living standards by adjudicator Mike Edison in September.
Their landlord Pranav Gulati criticised the decision, saying ‘‘landlords get blamed for everything’’, but Emery said Gulati’s actions showed he ‘‘didn’t care’’ about the living situation of two families living at the property.
Emery’s sister-in-law started experiencing hallucinations and seeing people that weren’t there when she was four months pregnant.
Her family first thought it was a complication of the pregnancy but later found out she had been suffering from encephalitis, a rare brain infection.
Emery’s sister-in-law was hospitalised in April and remains in hospital.
Speaking to Stuff Emery said her sister-in-law faced a lifelong recovery period from the infection, which caused her regular memory loss and seizures.
An infestation saga that stretched over several months at Emery’s seven-bedroom, twostorey, $1300-a-week rental property had been highlighted as a potential cause of the infection by the Tenancy Tribunal.
Encephalitis is an inflammation of the brain and can be caused by a viral or bacterial infection spread by rodents or insects.
Emery told the tribunal their problems with the property started in July 2017 when rats chewed into a water pipe above the kitchen ceiling.
Rodents nested in the roof space underneath the upper floor of the property. They chewed through the pipe, causing water to leak into the house.
A tradesman fixed the problem by cutting a hole in the ceiling to fix the pipe then sealing the roof back up within days. Emery told Stuff rat bait was laid in the ceiling but rodents chewed through the pipes again in November.
Another tradesman visited and ripped open the ceiling, leaving debris from the ceiling and nests scatted across the kitchen, Edison said.
Emery told Stuff it all happened without a warning from the tradesman to move anything and the two families were left with ‘‘big chunks of the roof and rat s...’’ all over the kitchen.
‘‘All the rat s... got in our food, got all over our dishes.’’
Her sister-in-law was pregnant at the time and Emery believed the woman’s weakened immune system left her more susceptible to encephalitis.
Edison said leaving the ceiling that way for months was a ‘‘significant breach’’ responsibilities.
‘‘It also potentially exposed the tenant and others living at the property to health risks associated with vermin,’’ Edison said.
‘‘It is unclear if those health risks eventuated but (the woman’s) admission to hospital suggests they may have done.’’
Speaking to Stuff about the case Gulati denied his property had been infested with rats and alleged the two families were behind in their rental payments.
Nerina Emery owed Gulati thousands in rent, something Edison acknowledged, awarding Gulati $6691 for missed rental payments.
Emery did not deny the rent arrears at the hearing, but told Stuff that at $1300 a week the repayments largely represented their last month at the property when the family struggled through a difficult period that combined a pregnancy, encephalitis and ‘‘a huge gaping hole in the roof’’.
‘‘Our family is broken from this whole ordeal.’’
Edison concluded Gulati had known about the problems at the property for months but never ‘‘proactively’’ made sure the work was done.
Gulati said he sent Emery the contact details of several contractors but admitted not being proactive was the ‘‘one mistake’’ he made. ‘‘I should have jumped in and gone to the property myself.’’ of Gulati’s