Across the world 100 children die from Rabies every day.
Over 99% of cases of human rabies are caused by an infected dog bite and in India; where more people die of rabies than anywhere else in the world; someone is bitten by a dog every 2 seconds. This deadly disease instils fear into local communities and every year millions of healthy dogs are inhumanely killed out of fear. However, this does not halt the spread of rabies and in some situations can actually increase the spread as street dogs move into vacant territories following a cull. Fortunately there is a solution to this devastating problem and the answer is mass canine vaccination and population control through neutering.
Mission Rabies is a project of the charity Worldwide Veterinary Services. It was started in India in 2013 with the aim to vaccinate 2 million dogs over 3 years in the key rabies affected areas. The first vaccination drive vaccinated 60,000 dogs in just 28 days. The charity also runs a mobile veterinary hospital truck with monthly surgical training courses to teach the local vets skills for neutering and to maintain vaccination programmes. They recruit international volunteers for monthly mass vaccination drives and work closely with local communities to educate children and adults how to understand dogs better so they can avoid dog bites and reduce the risk of rabies.
In September two vets from Calder Vets (Jane Scott and Lindsey Gould) will be volunteering with the project in India. They will be working on the streets of Goa vaccinating the dog population, GPS tracking the dogs vaccinated and educating the local people. Any support that you can offer to the project would be greatly appreciated and will go directly towards helping to eradicate this devastating but completely preventable disease. Donations can be made via our just giving page (www.justgiving.com/mission-rabies) or in any of the Calder Vets branches. With your help Mission Rabies can achieve their aim of eradicating the world from Rabies by 2030. Thank you.
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