Rabies Vaccination in Dogs in Laos: Owner Knowledge and Serological Status of Dogs

Rabies is an infectious disease which is virtually 100% fatal. Humans are most often infected through the bite of an infected dog, and most cases could be prevented by vaccinating dogs. However, vaccination coverage is insufficient in most countries where canine rabies occurs endemically. This study conducted interviews and sampling of dogs in Laos to understand more about the barriers for vaccination and to evaluate the antibody status of dogs using a commercial ELISA. The study found that only 62% out of 359 dog owners knew what rabies was, and only 24% knew the disease could be fatal. Higher education was associated with higher knowledge scores. Only 56 out of 437 (13%) dogs had been rabies vaccinated according to their owner, and out of these dogs, only 34 (61%) had antibodies, and only 48% had adequate levels (above 0.5 IU/mL). However, 24% of the dogs with no known history of vaccination had antibodies, indicating either exposure or vaccination in the past without the owner’s awareness. In conclusion, this study indicates that there is a low level of knowledge about rabies, and that owner knowledge is not a good indicator of whether a dog is vaccinated or not.

History of Rabies Incidence and Rabies Control in Serbia in Support of the Zero by 2030 Campaign to Eliminate Dog-Mediated Human Rabies

Urban (principally canine-mediated) rabies has been a public health risk for people living in Serbia for centuries. The first legal act in urban rabies prevention in Serbia was established in 1834 by introducing high taxes for pet dog owners. Five years later in 1839, the first set of literature describing rabies prevention was issued by the health department from The Serbian Ministry of Interior. An overview of cauterization of rabies wounds was presented as the principal method of rabies post exposure prophylaxis. In 1890, a human rabies vaccination was introduced in Serbia with the royal government directive which ordered patients to be treated at the Pasteur Institute in Budapest in receipt of rabies vaccination. Urban (canine) rabies was eliminated during the 1980s, but sylvatic (principally fox-mediated) rabies still prevailed. The last human rabies case was recorded in the Province of Kosovo and Metohija in 1980. Sylvatic rabies in Serbia is in the final stages of elimination by orally vaccinating foxes (Vulpes vulpes). The only published finding of a lyssavirus among Serbian bats was made in 1954 by Dr Milan Nikolić in the vicinity of Novi Sad. In 2006, a comprehensive two-year active surveillance program of lyssaviruses in bats in Serbia was undertaken. In this single study, all of the bats from Serbia tested negative for a lyssavirus.

Spatial Distribution and Population Estimation of Dogs in Thailand: Implications for Rabies Prevention and Control

Poor management of dog populations causes many problems in different countries, including rabies. To strategically design a dog population management, certain sets of data are required, such as the population size and spatial distribution of dogs. However, these data are rarely available or incomplete. Hence, this study aimed to describe the characteristics of dog populations in Thailand, explore their spatial distribution and relevant factors, and estimate the number of dogs in the whole country. First, four districts were selected as representatives of each region. Each district was partitioned into grids with a 300-m resolution. The selected grids were then surveyed, and the number of dogs and related data were collected. Random forest models with a two-part approach were used to quantify the association between the surveyed dog population and predictor variables. The spatial distribution of dog populations was then predicted. A total of 1,750 grids were surveyed (945 grids with dog presence and 805 grids with dog absence). Among the surveyed dogs, 86.6% (12,027/13,895) were owned. Of these, 51% were classified as independent, followed by confined (25%), semi-independent (21%), and unidentified dogs (3%). Seventy-two percent (1,348/1,868) of the ownerless dogs were feral, and the rest were community dogs. The spatial pattern of the dog populations was highly distributed in big cities such as Bangkok and its suburbs. In owned dogs, it was linked to household demographics, whereas it was related to community factors in ownerless dogs. The number of estimated dogs in the entire country was 12.8 million heads including 11.2 million owned dogs (21.7 heads/km2) and 1.6 million ownerless dogs (3.2 heads/km2). The methods developed here are extrapolatable to a larger area and use much less budget and manpower compared to the present practices. Our results are helpful for canine rabies prevention and control programs, such as dog population management and control and rabies vaccine allocation.

Lateral flow devices for samples collected by straw sampling method for postmortem canine rabies diagnosis

The direct fluorescent antibody test (dFAT) using brain sample after opening the skull is the standard rabies diagnostic test in animal rabies. However, it is not feasible in many resource-limited settings. Lateral flow devices (LFD) combined with a simple sampling methodology is quicker, simpler, and less hazardous than the standard test and can be a useful tool. We conducted a prospective on-site study to evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of the LFD with the straw sampling method compared with that of the dFAT with the skull opening procedure for post-mortem canine rabies diagnosis. We collected 97 rabies-suspected animals between December 1, 2020 and March 31, 2021. Among the 97 samples, 53 and 50 cases were positive tests for dFAT and LFD, respectively. The sensitivity and specificity of LFD with straw sampling method were 94.3% (95% confidence interval [CI], 84.3–98.8%) and 100% (95% CI, 92.0–100%), respectively. The performance of LFD by the straw sampling method showed relatively high sensitivity and 100% specificity compared with that of dFAT performed on samples collected after opening the skull. This methodology can be beneficial and is a strong tool to overcome limited animal surveillance in remote areas. However, because of our limited sample size, more data using fresh samples on-site and the optimizations are urgently needed for the further implementation in endemic areas.

Spatial scale of transmission explains how acute infections circulate at low prevalence

Fundamental questions remain about the regulation of acute pathogens in the absence of acquired immunity. This is especially true for canine rabies, a universally fatal zoonosis. From tracing rabies transmission in a population of 50,000 dogs in Tanzania between 2002-2016 we unravel the processes through which rabies is regulated and persists, fitting individual-based models to spatially-resolved data to investigate the mechanisms modulating transmission and the scale over which they operate. We find that while prevalence never exceeds 0.15%, we detect significant susceptible depletion at local scales commensurate with rabid dog movement, reducing transmission through clustering of rabies deaths and individuals incubating infection. Individual variation in rabid dog behaviour facilitates virus dispersal and co-circulation of lineages, enabling metapopulation persistence. These mechanisms likely operate in many pathogens circulating in spatially structured populations, with important implications for prediction and control, yet are unobservable unless the scale of host interactions is identified.

Rabies Virus in Sierra Leone: Challenges and Recommended Solutions for Elimination by 2030

The objective of this write-up is to find possible solution control canine rabies virus in Sierra Leone and other low-income countries in the world. Rabies is a viral disease affecting both humans and animals in Sierra Leone. The country has no policy on dog ownership and management, two veterinarians, limited access to rabies vaccines and human immunoglobin, and a lack of information about the disease in the country despite increasing dog bite cases and death. There is no wildlife specialist to initiate wildlife vaccination. Continuous vaccination increased awareness, trained personnel in veterinary and wildlife, development of policies on responsible dog ownership and by-laws and increase financial support from the government and private sector will help Sierra Leone eliminate rabies in the first half of the twenty-first century.

U.S. dog importations during the COVID-19 pandemic: Do we have an erupting problem?

Dog importation data from 2018–2020 were evaluated to ascertain whether the dog importation patterns in the United States changed during the COVID-19 pandemic, specifically with regard to denial of entry. Dog denial of entry reports from January 1, 2018, to December 31, 2020, stored within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Quarantine Activity Reporting System (QARS), were reviewed. Basic descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. Reason for denial, country of origin, and month of importation were all examined to determine which countries of origin resulted in the largest number of denials, and whether there was a seasonal change in importations during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020), compared to previous years (2018 and 2019). During 2020, CDC denied entry to 458 dogs. This represents a 52% increase in dogs denied entry compared to the averages in 2018 and 2019. Dogs were primarily denied entry for falsified rabies vaccination certificates (56%). Three countries exported 74% of all dogs denied entry into the United States, suggesting that targeted interventions may be needed for certain countries. Increased attempts to import inadequately vaccinated dogs from countries with canine rabies in 2020 may have been due to the increased demand for domestic pets during the COVID-19 pandemic. Educational messaging should highlight the risk of rabies and the importance of making informed pet purchases from foreign entities to protect pet owners, their families, and the public.

Knowledge, attitude, and practices associated with rabies in villages with different dog vaccination statuses in Cambodia

Background and Aim: Rabies is a highly infectious but neglected zoonotic disease. Almost 99% of rabies-related human deaths are caused by dog-mediated rabies. Although canine rabies vaccination is highly effective and provides protection, nationwide rabies vaccination campaigns have been insufficient in Cambodia, resulting in a limited number of rabies vaccinated dogs. This study aimed to explore the rabies knowledge, attitude, and practices (KAP) among participants from both dog rabies vaccinated (DRV) and dog rabies unvaccinated (DRUV) villages located in the Kandal and Prey Veng Provinces, Cambodia. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted with dog owners in Kandal and Prey Veng Provinces, Cambodia, during August and September 2020. The structural questionnaire collected general sociodemographic information and the KAP associated with rabies transmission, clinical signs, management, and control. The data were then analyzed using Wilcoxon rank-sum test and Chi-square statistics. Results: In total, 312 participants were interviewed: 137 participants from DRV villages and 175 from DRUV villages. Among them, 99.4% (310/312) had previously heard about rabies. Out of these 310, 93.5% (290/310) were aware that rabies is a fatal disease, while 96.5% (299/310) were willing to vaccinate their dog against rabies if the vaccination was provided for free. However, 32.9% (102/310) indicated that they would be willing to sell their own dog if it bit someone or showed aggression. More than one-third (115/310) of all the respondents had poor overall KAP regarding rabies. The respondents from DRV villages had significantly higher overall scores with regard to rabies KAP than those from DRUV villages (p<0.0001). According to the factors related to overall KAP, village type and education level were significantly associated with overall KAP of the respondents (p<0.0001). Conclusion: The rabies disease is recognized in Cambodia, and dog owners are willing to vaccinate their dogs if the vaccination is provided for free. The overall rabies-related KAP were poor among 30% of the respondents, and higher KAP scores were obtained for the DRV villages. The village type and education level were found to be associated with the different overall KAP of the participants.

The Impact of Socioeconomic Factors on Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices of Dog Owners on Dog Rabies Control in Thailand

Rabies is a deadly zoonotic disease responsible for almost 60,000 deaths each year, especially in Africa and Asia including Thailand. Dogs are the major reservoirs for rabies virus in these settings. This study thus used the concept of knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP) to identify socioeconomic factors that contribute to the differences in the canine rabies occurrences in high and low-risk areas which were classified by a Generalized Additive Model (GAM). Multistage sampling was then applied to designate the study locations and a KAP-based questionnaire was used to retrieve data and relevant perspectives from the respondents. Based on the responses from 476 participants living across four regions of Thailand, we found that the knowledge of the participants was positively correlated with their behaviors but negatively associated with the attitudes. Participants who are male, younger, educated at the level of middle to high school, or raising more dogs are likely to have negative attitudes but good knowledge on rabies prevention and control whereas farmers with lower income had better attitudes regardless of their knowledge. We found that people in a lower socioeconomic status with a lack of knowledge are not willing to pay at a higher vaccine price. Public education is a key to change dog owners' behaviors. Related authorities should constantly educate people on how to prevent and control rabies in their communities. Our findings should be applicable to other countries with similar socioeconomic statuses.