Epidemiology of Rabies

Dr. Baz Muhammad Junejo writes a letter to the editor-in-chief of The Veterinary News & Views regarding the epidemiology of rabies.

Rabies is a viral disease. All warm-blooded animals are susceptible to it. The main source of rabies is the rabid dog, that spreads the disease to humans and other animals. It results in loss of life, especially among children.

According to my experience in this field, certain predisposing factors increase a dog’s vulnerability to this disease, such as when the dog is hungry, thirsty, strained, or beaten. Female dogs, in particular, are stressed during the two breeding seasons (March-April and September-October). In this period, male dogs fight each other, commencing the spread of the disease. The common symptoms of rabies include fever, lethargy, aimless sprints, bitting nearby objects (walls, pillars, and, trees), nervousness, paralysis of legs, difficulty in breathing, hypersalination due to difficulty in swallowing, hydrophobia (fear of water), irritability, and hyper-excitability.
The mortality among children due to rabies has become frequently reported news stories nowadays. What has fostered such outbreaks has been the inability to control stray dogs effectively.

To reduce the occurrence of this disease, the union council needs to be empowered to ensure proper planning and implementation of the following roadmap.

Counsellors need to be trained to coordinate with the livestock department, the health department, the social welfare department, and the civil society in controlling the malady.
Awareness campaigns should be run at a massive scale through social media and print media, especially regarding the season, risk factors, common symptoms, and possible preventive measures.
Water feed should be arranged, and placed in clean pots on the roadside, in the gardens, and in open spaces. The local communities can collaborate to assist in this regard.
Awareness seminars should be conducted with the local residents, school teachers, and students regarding the behaviour of dealing with stray dogs.
Inclusion of rabies in the academic curriculum at the primary level should be necessitated.
The preventive vaccination against rabies should be readily available.
Spaying in female dogs and neutering/castration in male dogs should be arranged to limit the number of stray dogs.
Mosques should announce and warn the members of the community, especially children and the elderly, to stay indoors in case of rabid stray dogs, which threaten the safety of the public.
The culling of rabid dogs must be prioritised to suppress the spread of the disease.
If an individual is bitten or scratched by a rabid dog, they should abruptly be provided first aid by washing the wound and properly removing the saliva with an abundance of tap water.