In 2015, the World Health Organization and others announced a goal to eliminate rabies deaths worldwide by 2030. On WorldRabiesDay, take an inside look at the global campaign, which NewsfromScience covered in 2017: ScienceMagArchives
On a Sunday evening last July, Flora Gichonge was walking with her friends to church near the village of Gesarya, Tanzania. Suddenly, they were attacked by something hellish: A rabid dog, foaming at the mouth, charged out of the dense bushes lining the dirt road."We tried to run away, in fear," the 25-year-old recalls. But she tripped and fell. The dog lunged and bit her in the backside before her friends drove it away by throwing stones.
That's why the global plan calls for cheaper and faster treatment for people. But its long-term bet is on vaccinating domestic dogs, which pose the biggest threat to people in the developing world."It's the only way you're going to eliminate the problem," says Louise Taylor, scientific director of the Global Alliance for Rabies Control, an advocacy group based in Manhattan, Kansas.
Although the 2030 target seems improbable, if not impossible, proponents point to a few successful efforts—including the brief defeat of dog rabies in N'Djamena, the capital of dirt-poor Chad—to show that the disease can be beaten back even in Africa."It's not going to be fast, easy, or inexpensive," says Charles Rupprecht, a rabies expert and consultant near Atlanta."But it can be done.
Dog vaccines were first developed in the 1920s. Still, it took decades to eliminate rabid dogs as a public health threat in Europe, Japan, and elsewhere. Now, Latin America is on the verge of replicating the success , following a concerted and coordinated campaign that reaches 40 million to 50 million dogs each year.Countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have made steady progress toward eliminating canine rabies.
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