Worse than? I don’t know how you got on that but the problems and diseases with rodents go beyond just bubonic plague.
Post 41 mentions some and here is the CDC.
https://www.cdc.gov/healthy-pets/rodent-control/index.html
Diseases spread directly by rodents
Certain diseases can spread from rodents to people through direct contact with infected rodents. This can be through breathing in contaminated air, touching contaminated materials and then touching eyes, nose, or mouth. They can also spread by being bitten or scratched by an infected rodent, or eating food contaminated by an infected rodent.
Bacterial diseases
Leptospirosis
Rat-Bite Fever
Salmonellosis
Sylvatic Typhus
Tularemia
Viral diseases
Hantavirus
Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome
Lassa Fever
Lujo Hemorrhagic Fever
Lymphocytic Choriomeningitis (LCM)
Monkeypox
Omsk Hemorrhagic Fever
South American Arenaviruses*
*Argentine hemorrhagic fever, Bolivian hemorrhagic fever, Chapare Hemorrhagic Fever, Sabiá-associated hemorrhagic fever, and Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever.
Diseases spread indirectly by rodents
Certain diseases can spread from rodents to people through indirect contact. This can occur when people are bitten by ticks, mites, fleas, and mosquitos that have fed on infected rodents. Diseases can also spread to people from rodents through the consumption of an intermediate host (for example, beetles or cockroaches).
Bacterial diseases
Anaplasmosis
Borreliosis
Flea-borne (Murine) Typhus
Lyme disease
Plague
Rickettsialpox
Scrub typhus
Tick-borne Relapsing Fever
Tularemia
Parasitic Diseases
Angiostrongylus
Babesiosis
Cutaneous leishmaniasis
Hymenolepis diminuta
Moniliformis moniliformis
Viral diseases
Colorado tick fever
La Crosse virus
Powassan virus
Yeah, and so what? Now do the mortality stats on those.
All I did was point out that killing rats spreads bubonic plague because the fleas find humans as new hosts.
How many of those have ever had mortality rates of 30-50% sometimes approaching 80%?