That was absolutely the right thing to do for your family. It sucks about your bat buddy though.

If you want to help bats, you can put up a bat house. There are plans for ones online to build one yourself. Bat are really struggling, between white nose fungus and humans their populations are really declining.

And keep a lookout for bats in need, when they get hurt they can be help. There might be a licensed bat rescue near you that could save them. I found a bat in my attic that had fallen into a bucket of water. It was winter and there was ice in with him! I was able to get him in a box and took him to a rehab the next day. He made a full recovery and was released that spring.

Bucket the bat being looked over by the rehaber

Yeah, its a really crazy virus. If you get bit or scratched by a mammal, that you don’t know for certain is vaccinated, get the vaccine.

They were more than likely infected but not yet showing symptoms. Carrying rabies but not a carrier of rabies. If you get bit in the foot, it takes awhile to reach your brain.

Plus the test for rabies needs brain tissue, cant just test blood or the organ to be transplanted

There’s even some evidence that it can be longer. I found one that was a 6 year incubation.

WTF

Every example you gave is still inappropriate, as they are not about work. I worked in the public sector and that would have been shut down. Federal employees are held to a higher standard, especially if they have a high security clearance. They get funny about spending because it is tax payers dollars. Using a work computer on a government account during paid hours to talk about personal things, nope. There are a bunch of rules they were breaking.

I’m not saying they they weren’t targeted, but they were still in the wrong.

But it was a group chat for work. In anything even a little bit security driven it’s only for work related activities, just like email. I can’t imagine talking about anything related to sex or medical operations on teams.