Stepwise Approach towards Rabies Elimination (SARE)

Assessment

The Assessment component of the SARE enables users to objectively assess the present-day rabies situation across a country, with the tool assessing strengths and weaknesses in terms of seven core components that are critical for effective rabies control and elimination strategies.

SARE Score

Upon completing the Assessment component, a SARE score is automatically generated. The score provides an indication of the progress the assessed country has made towards achieving rabies elimination. The score is provided in increments of 0,5, beginning at Stage 0 (endemic for dog-mediated rabies) and reaching Stage 5 (freedom from dog-mediated rabies).

Detailed outputs from the SARE assessment

In addition to the SARE score, a comprehensive list of both accomplished and pending activities are presented to the user.

Accomplished activities

While the SARE score is valuable in terms of measuring programmatic progress, the accomplished activities provide the users with a formidable advocacy tool that can be used to highlight successes, measure progress, and lobby for further investment in the rabies control program.

Pending activities

The pending activities, on the other hand, can help users focus their efforts toward the continued implementation and improvement of rabies control and elimination programs. To address and accomplish these pending activities, expert guidance is provided through direct links to the Canine Rabies Blueprint for every activity. This provides users with resources and tools that would help accomplish the pending activities. In addition, the next steps to address the pending activities can be planned through the generation of a country-specific workplan as described below.

Workplan

The Practical workplan component summarizes all the “pending SARE activities” and automatically creates a unique rabies control and elimination workplan that can be used to ensure the pending activities get addressed in a timely manner. To do this, the workplan generates suggested contents for each “Pending SARE activity”, with the information broken down according to the following headings:

1. Suggested steps to achieve the activity;
2. Expected Outcomes;
3. Responsible authorities;
4. Timeframes (including Gantt charts); and
5. Key Performance Indicators. 

As the workplan is populated with suggested contents when being generated, users only need to customize the workplan to fit their own needs instead of drafting an entire document. In so doing, the automatically generated multi-year workplan is immediately actionable and measurable on an activity-by-activity basis.

It should be noted that the rabies workplan is not intended to replace a National Strategic Plan (NSP). Instead, the workplan supplements the NSP by providing the granular details with regards to how the NSP will be implemented and be realized.            

What if I want to add a costing estimate to my workplan?

The Global Dog Rabies Elimination Pathway (GDREP) tool complements the SARE as a means to develop an estimated cost for the rabies elimination program for budgeting and advocacy purposes. This tool is the ideal counterpart to create a realistic budget for the workplan generated using the SARE.