A word from our Executive Director

The Global Alliance for Rabies Control (GARC) aims to support rabies control and elimination efforts throughout the dog rabies endemic world. We remain convinced that large scale rabies elimination can be achieved if we are able to provide the most appropriate kind of support for those particular settings where it is needed.

We endeavor to complement and support the mandates of institutions such as National Governments and Intergovernmental Agencies and we believe that our major value is fundamentally based on progressing effective regional and global cooperation and collaboration. This approach includes the formation and maintenance of functional networks and to accompany this, the development and advancement of innovative tools and solutions that might be most helpful towards the goal of rabies elimination.

On top of this platform are the Rabies Epidemiological Bulletin suite of surveillance tools (REB, global surveillance and many other functions, DHIS2-based), the Stepwise Approach towards Rabies Elimination (SARE, planning and strategizing), the GARC Educational Platform (GEP), the Rabies Control Networks (PARACON, ARACON, MERACON), the End Rabies Now campaign (ERN) and World Rabies Day (WRD). All of these elements are also offered in our strong collaboration with the United Against Rabies (UAR) forum.

An outline of our activities for 2021 is presented in an accompanying article. In this regard, we would like to sincerely thank our donors, partners and collaborators. Thank for your support and for sharing our vision – without this, we would not have been able to move forward. I also wish to thank all of GARC for your innovation and adaptivity. Thank you for your positivity, for keeping focused and for going the extra mile during these extraordinary times.

Article contributed by: Professor Louis Nel, Executive Director, GARC