Eric Adams, New York’s Pied Piper, declares war on rats

ASIDE FROM the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building, is there a more quintessential image of New York then a rat carefully, nay heroically, carrying a slice of pizza down some subway stairs? The horror and admiration of New Yorkers sent footage of “Pizza Rat” viral in 2015. Little admiration has been directed at rats of late. Rat sightings, as reported to the city’s 311 customer-service number, rose by more than 70% in the first nine months of the year against the same period in 2020. Eric Adams, the mayor, said recently his administration will make the Big Apple liveable by “fighting crime, fighting inequality, fighting rats”.