How much do you know about armadillos? Asher Kade had never even heard of armadillos before he moved to Texas and confronted many of them. But he dug up a lot of fascinating facts about the ancient animals. For instance, they can walk underwater and hold their breath up to six minutes! But they are endangered because they don't reproduce well, as you'll learn in this article at Environmental Graffiti. Link -via Look At This
(Image credit: Wikimedia Commons user Kolossos)
Even still, I won't be picking any of these little guys up anytime soon. You don't hear about people getting rabies from bats, but you still should not mess with them.
There has been NO known transference (or infection) of Mycobacterium leprae from touching a armadillo (dead or alive).
There are a few VERY rare cases of infection from eating under-cooked armadillo meat.
So as long as you're not looking for a quick armadillo sushi snack, you have NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT.
Besides which, Hansen's Disease (Leprosy) was first treatable in the 40's and treatment was perfected using a 3-drug cocktail in the 70's.
(rolls eyes)