A rabies vaccination for a sheepdog in East Africa

rabies

A risk for animals and humans

Germany has been officially rabies-free for five years, as announced by the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection in 2008. A functioning vaccination system and good medical care have meant that the disease no longer poses an acute danger in this country. It is easy to forget that rabies is still a very real threat to people in other parts of the world. The Maasai ethnic group in our project area knows about rabies and can recognize it when it occurs. What was lacking until now was the knowledge that it can be transmitted to humans and that rabies can be vaccinated against. That is why we initially received incredulous faces when we approached the Maasai to offer them free vaccinations for their dogs.

need

There are still many human deaths from rabies every year, although infection can be prevented by simply vaccinating dogs

activity

Veterinarians Without Borders sends Kenyan veterinarians to remote villages to protect and educate people without access to health care about rabies.

Measurable performance

Number of vaccinations that could be carried out for domestic and herding dogs

Result

Measurable reduction in rabies transmission to humans through sensitized handling of animals and vaccinations

Systemically relevant impact

Improved health and safer interactions for people with dogs and wild animals.

background

Through the rabies control project in the Kenyan Masai Mara (Serengeti National Park), Veterinarians Without Borders wants to help protect people and animals from rabies infection. Keeping dogs is a common method of protecting livestock, such as goats or chickens, from attacks by predators. There are around 20,000 domestic and sheepdogs in our organization's project area alone. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 55,000 people die of rabies every year, around 95 percent of them in Africa and Asia. Dogs are the most common source of infection for humans: 99 percent of human deaths worldwide are due to the virus being transmitted through bites from rabid domestic and sheepdogs. Children are particularly at risk, as 40 percent of victims of dog bites from animals suspected of having rabies are children under 15 years of age. They are often scratched or bitten by dogs while playing. The fatal thing is that they are usually not aware of the danger of rabies infection and therefore do not draw attention to minor injuries, so that they go unnoticed. But the disease can only be stopped if professional medical treatment is given immediately after the bite. The treatment essentially consists of wound cleaning, disinfection and immunization and costs the equivalent of around US$40 in Africa - costs that are difficult for the average household to afford, considering that the average income there is around US$1.50 per day per person. In order to contain rabies worldwide at low cost, the WHO recommends the preventive vaccination of dogs.

Masai Mara, Serengeti Nationalpark, Kenia

The good deed

The project is extremely simple and yet effective: in teams of two or three, our local vets drive to the remote villages in a jeep once or twice a year, equipped with vaccines, syringes and medications for other common animal diseases. The villagers are informed in advance of the planned vaccinations via a megaphone so that they do not move their cattle and dogs to the distant pastures. The team then visits village after village in our project area and vaccinates all the dogs, and sometimes also the cats, which are rarer there. Because there is no basic veterinary care in the area, our teams are the only ones who provide veterinary help.

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