Dead rat drives patient from surgery

LONDON, March 7 (UPI) -- A young British man scheduled for knee surgery walked out of the operating room after he was told a bad smell might be a dead rat.

Andrew Cowper told The Sun that the surgeon at Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Welwyn Garden City was the one who said the smell might be from a rotting rodent and advised him that there was no health risk.

"He said the smell didn't represent a health risk but I was appalled," Cowper said. "I asked him, 'If you were me would you have the operation?' He looked at me and said 'no', so I decided there and then I wasn't going to go ahead."

Hospital employees eventually found a dead rat on the roof, some distance from the operating theater.

Cowper, 19, had waited 11 months for surgery after hurting his knee playing soccer. The hospital says it is trying to reschedule him.