Rabies in Pastoral system in Kenya
DOGS IN PASTORAL SYSTEMS
- Dogs at the Centre
- History of Rabies
- Rabies in Kenya’s pastoral systems
Dogs at the Centre
In Africa, domestic dogs are part of the community playing the role of both working animals and companionship.
People primarily get rabies through dog bites and to a lesser extent from livestock. Domestic dogs are at the center of infection-transmission getting infected by wild dogs like hyenas and jackals. The rabid domestic dog then infects the livestock and people around them. The rabies virus is found in a dog’s saliva, and infects people and other animals through bites and licking. A rabid dog can infect other animals without showing full blow signs of rabies.
HISTORY OF DISEASES IN KENYA
In the 1950s up to the 1970s, Kenya had successful rabies vaccination campaigns in dogs and achieved a near-zero rabies infection rate. Unfortunately, with the advent of the structural adjustment programs in the 1980s and the drying up of donor funds, public rabies vaccinations campaigns stopped abruptly. This lead to a sharp rise in new infections in both dogs and people. Fast forward to today, rabies is classified as endemic and is listed as one of the top five priority zoonotic diseases in Kenya for control.
In Kenya, rabies kills about 2,000 people annually with parts of the eastern Kenya (Machakos, Kitui, Makueni counties) and western Kenyan (Siaya, Kisumu, and HomaBay) counties reporting the highest incidence of the disease. Dog bite annual incidence (bites/human population) in Kenya varies between 300-400/100,000, this is thought to be grossly underestimated.
Rabies in Pastrol Systems
In pastoral communities’ dogs are an integral part of herding systems, providing early warning to herders on approaching cattle rustlers and predator wildlife in the area. Because pastoral communities herd their livestock around national parks, the dogs in pastoral systems encounter wildlife when performing their role as defenders making them the first victims of rabid bites from attacking hyenas.
Furthermore, in most pastoral communities, young boys herd the livestock, making them the second victims of rabid bites. Back in the village dogs are pets often playing with children. Another behavior characteristic in the village is that dogs roam freely within the community even when they are owned by a particular family. The dogs return back home in the evening. This roaming behavior means dogs are mixing with other strange dogs and wild dogs and can easily bring home the rabies disease.
Both the above dog-behavior in pastoral communities explains why children below the age of 15 years,especially boys are the most affected by rabies.
RABIES ELIMINATION STRATEGY
Sustained mass dog rabies vaccination of greater than 70% of the local dog population is the single most cost-effective strategy to control and eliminate dog-mediated human rabies. In 2015, the government developed a 15-year strategy to eliminate dog-mediated human rabies in Kenya by 2030. The rabies strategy is a comprehensive, risk-based step-wise approach to progressively reduce rabies cases through coordination with the health, veterinary,public security, and education sectors. The step-wise approach has six stages each building on the previous stage. At stage six, the
country is declared free of rabies.
The first stage of the approach is carrying out annual mass-dog vaccination prioritizing counties with high numbers of rabies cases and where the county is enclosed by natural barriers such as mountains and water bodies. Using these criteria, the counties chosen were: Kisumu and Siaya counties in Western Kenya, which have Lake Victoria on the West and the Nandi escarpment to the East as barriers to natural dog movement. Makueni, Machakos, and Kitui located to the east of Nairobi. Kajiado and Laikipia counties are located to the south and northwest of Nairobi respectively.
Once 70% of dogs in each region have been vaccinated, active diseases surveillance and responding to any rabies outbreak will follow. The strategy includes public awareness on rabies,availing timely post-exposure vaccines to bite patients as well as establishing an effective surveillance system for animal and human rabies.
Eco Clubs of Kenya
Eco Clubs of Kenya is a community organization based in Kajiado County, Kenya. Eco Clubs of Kenya works closely with the local community to prevent and control rabies by raising awareness of the disease, vaccinating dogs, cats, and livestock, and promoting responsible dog population management and dog ownership.
Our rabies vaccination campaigns are carried out during natural disasters when livestock migrate, floods and droughts, or human-wildlife conflicts displace wildlife.
Eco Clubs of Kenya also educate school teachers and children on responsible dog ownership, first aid for rabies bites, animal welfare, and follows up on dog bites’ reports or sighting of wild dogs with suspected signs roaming the area.
Eco Clubs of Kenya supports a rabies-free Kenya by 2030 under the global “zero by 2030” campaign toend human deaths from dog-transmitted rabies by 2030.
https://ecoclubsofkenya.co.ke
