If all students become aware of rabies, they can spread awareness to other parts of the society, says Dr Laxmikant Gode, who suggests educating the teachers first
New Delhi, November 4, 2019: Several cases of rabies never make it to the headlines and there may be many cases which may not have been reported to the hospitals and appeared in the news. In all such cases, it’s very clear that the patients died of rabies because of lack of vaccines/immunoglobulins and facilities at the hospital, or time lost for shifting patient from one hospital to another, improper diagnosis, or treatment started very late and so on.
However, one thing has come out very strongly is that people are still not really well aware about the disease with respect to its causes, symptoms, first-aid, and treatment. This is in spite of the knowledge that dog bite is a serious issue and the patient may die. Dog bites account for 99% of rabies cases. So making people aware of the rabies is the first step towards its control.
At a global meeting ‘Driving progress towards rabies elimination’ in Kathmandu recently, Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO South-East Asia, said that human rabies is caused mostly by dogs and can be eliminated by increasing awareness about the disease. At the meeting, the member countries shared initiatives being rolled out as part of the new ‘Zero by 30: The Strategic Plan’, to be launched by the WHO and its partners to end dog-transmitted rabies. “The plan centres on ‘One Health’ approach and addresses the disease in a holistic and cross- sectoral manner,” said a communiqué. “It aims at preventing and responding to dog-transmitted rabies by improving awareness and education, reducing human rabies risk through expanded dog vaccinations, and improving access to healthcare, medicines and vaccines for populations at risk.”
The plan calls for generating and measuring the impact by implementing proven effective guidelines for rabies control and encouraging the use of innovative surveillance technologies to monitor progress towards “Zero by 30”. Even WHO is advocating that awareness is the key factor to its objective of “Zero by 30”.
The question is how it would be undertaken in country like India having poor awareness and infrastructure? The major concern is rapidly increasing population of stray dogs not only in rural areas but also in the developed urban
parts. In the area where I stay in Ahmedabad, I have seen dog strength rapidly increasing from a couple of dogs to more than 30 in last two-three years and in next few years it would be around 100. Few animal lovers feed them every day on the road, some on the road divider. The dogs move ferociously chasing cars, two wheelers and people around. Accidents are common due to menace of such dogs.
The task is really challenging. In my last article, I mentioned that only awareness is a vital part in eradication of rabies. Each and every person should be educated about the rabies. Few suggestions were also mentioned like building a strong infrastructure of small institutions across the country. One such infrastructure amongst many which can help to make people aware is schools and colleges. If all students become aware of rabies, they can spread awareness to other part of the society.
The simple strategy to make this happen is to educate the teacher. How? Health department/NGOs can arrange training sessions for the teachers. Two teachers from each school should be selected and trained with respect to details of rabies, including first-aid immediately after dog bite. These teachers will further educate all teachers in their respective schools. All trained teachers will then educate all the students in their respective schools. Just imagine how many students would be covered in a short duration of time. These students will spread awareness in their families, neighbours, friends and relatives.
The advantage of this strategy is that one teacher becomes permanent member of rabies education and awareness system till his retirement. That means there is a permanent team of teachers all over the country educating each and every student. Another advantage is that the cost involved in the education of teachers is only one time. I feel that widespread nature of schools and colleges would be a key factor to successfully implement mass awareness programmes to make citizens aware of deadly rabies across the country and we have the possibility to reduce the cases of rabid dog bite and deaths and to be part of “ZERO by 30”.
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