PANAJI
Concerted efforts by the government, local bodies and NGOs have successfully nipped the number of human rabies deaths in the State from as many as 17 in 2014, the highest in two decades, to a single case in 2016.
Significantly, there has not been a single human rabies death till June this year, but the number of dog bite cases have shown an upward trend between 2014 and 2016.
These findings were presented by Dr Amit Dias, Asst Professor, Department of Preventive & Social Medicine, Goa Medical College, in his paper on the status of rabies in Goa over the last two decades, at the XIXth National Conference of the Association of Prevention and Control of Rabies in India (APCRICON 2017), in the State earlier this month.
Mindful of the WHO's global framework to reach zero human rabies deaths by 2030, Dr Dias was principal investigator for the State for the WHO-APCRI study in 2003, which provided the first authentic data on the status of rabies in the state.
According to Dr Dias, multiple methods were used to understand the disease and the incidence of dog bite cases in the State.
The rabies cases from 1992-2002, picked from the Infectious Disease hospital at Ponda, earlier identified as the centre for managing people with Rabies in Goa, revealed 55 cases during that period.
Dr Dias along with his student, Yash Vernekar, then conducted a study to understand the trends in rabies for 2004-2014 and their study revealed 62 human rabies deaths in the State during this period, of which 57 were from Goa. Incidentally, 20% of these 57 deaths were in children.
Of these 57 cases, investigations revealed that human rabies deaths were attributed to dog bites were 91%, consisting of stray dogs (77%), victims pet (9%) and neighborhood dogs (5%). Cats were responsible for 3% of the deaths, while 3% were from wild animals such as wild cats and jackals, state Dr Dias at the conference.
In 2014, the State recorded the highest number of 17 human rabies deaths in two decades.
Investigations by Dr Dias revealed that anti-rabies treatment was initiated in only 24% of all rabies cases between 2004 and 2014, with only one individual actually completing the whole course of five doses. Only one patient had received the Rabies immunoglobulin.
Moreover, only 23% had washed the wound with soap and water, considered an extremely
essential step in prevention of rabies to kill the virus from the local site before it latches on to the nerve.
Stepping up efforts to control rabies cases in Goa, the government along with NGOs such as Mission Rabies and panchayats
initiated concerted initiatives across the State.
Rabies vaccines was made available at all PHCs in the State, while rabies immunoglobulin was also made available at larger hospitals.
These efforts paid off and the human rabies deaths dropped to five in 2015, one in 2016 and no death till date this year, stated Dr Dias at the conference.
While the number of rabies cases have dropped significantly, the number of dog bite cases have shown a gradual rise, from 16,166 cases (2014), 16,478 cases (2015), 18,585 (2016) and 9094 (as of June 2017).
