An opportunity to talk to the Queen about rabies

On February 27th, rabies researchers were amongst a group from Boyd Orr Centre for Population and Ecosystem Health at the University of Glasgow, accepting a Queen's Anniversary Prize for Higher and Further Education at Buckingham Palace in London.

The award recognizes the centre’s scientific excellence and the global impact of its work on infectious diseases. Their translational research aims to benefit the health and livelihoods of agricultural communities and wildlife conservation in developing countries. It acknowledged the importance of the One Health approach to disease control, and international collaborative efforts. The centre’s work covers several infectious diseases, but their work on rabies was given special mention.

The rabies research, involving Katie Hampson, Tiziana Lembo, Sunny Townsend, Sarah Cleaveland and Dan Haydon, has addressed several aspects of rabies epidemiology in Africa and Asia relevant to the control of the disease. The research conducted over many years by this group constitutes a large part of the evidence that the Global Alliance for Rabies Control and others use to advocate for the elimination of canine rabies. 

The award ceremony itself took place in the plush ballroom of Buckingham Palace, with the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh personally greeting representatives from each institution receiving an award. The Queen then spoke individually to the researchers in the long, thin Picture Gallery. Dr Sunny Townsend (pictured) waited patiently (and a little nervously!) at the far end of the Gallery and eventually was able to speak to her Majesty briefly about the problem of rabies in the developing world, and how it affected the relationship between people and their dogs. Sadly there was no time to ask if the Queen’s corgis travelled with her and were vaccinated against rabies!

Written by Louise Taylor with contributions from Sarah Cleveland and Sunny Townsend