GARC joins effort to control rabies in Indonesia
Geneva, Switzerland – The Global Alliance for Rabies Control (GARC) has signed a Memorandum of Agreement with national government leaders in Indonesia to jointly tackle the growing threat of rabies in the country.
The agreement sees the launch of GARC’s first major project in the country, a rabies prevention and elimination program in Nias, the largest island off Sumatra’s west coast. Nias, which has a human population of 750,000 and an estimated dog population of 76,000, was once considered rabies free but has been battling an outbreak of the disease since 2010. It is believed that a general lack of infrastructure and knowledge of the disease, aided by the complex earthquake prone terrain, are the main reasons that rabies was able to establish itself on the island.
The provincial government of North Sumatra and districts in Nias Island has developed a roadmap with the goal of eliminating rabies in the area by 2015. GARC’s role is to assist the provincial government in designing a coordinated strategy. This strategy involves the roll out of modern diagnostic and surveillance practices, improving accessibility of post-exposure vaccines, mass dog vaccination and working with schools and communities to raise awareness of the disease along with teaching basic preventative measures. The agreement will see Nias become one of GARC’s Communities Against Rabies Exposure (CARE) demonstration sites. The Nias project will apply the lessons learned from GARC’s other community-based projects and implement a similar model for the elimination of canine and human rabies on the island.
Commenting on the signing of the agreement, Dr. Pudjiatmoko, Director of Animal Health, Indonesia’s Directorate General of Livestock and Animal Health Services (DGLAHS), said: “We welcome this initiative and appreciate what it aims to achieve as it is in accordance with our vision to free Indonesia from rabies by 2020.”
Dr. Mary Elizabeth Miranda, GARC Director for Asia, said: “GARC looks forward to sharing the lessons learned and expertise acquired working with our partners on our project sites in the Philippines, to help our Indonesian colleagues achieve their goal of rabies elimination on Nias Island. We welcome this MoU as a major step towards our common goal of eliminating dog-mediated rabies in Asia.”
About CARE
The CARE Project is a three-year program facilitated by GARC. It aims to engage government authorities, the global scientific community and most importantly, local communities to scale up novel integrated models to include multiple diseases and other public health concerns.
Along with Nias Island in Indonesia, other CARE initiative sites in Asia include the Provinces of Ilocos Norte and Sorsogon, Marikina City and Cainta Municipality in the Philippines.
In Africa, two sites have been selected: N'djamena in Chad, and Tanzania.
The components of the initiative are: prevention of dog bites and human rabies; establishment of sustainable diagnostic and surveillance systems; elimination of rabies in the vector species (dogs); community awareness and mobilization; and, integration of rabies prevention and responsible pet ownership education into elementary schools.
The Nias program benefits from funding support from the UBS Optimus Foundation and the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA).