MOPH pushes for rabies-free zones in 2020

BANGKOK, 21 April 2016 (NNT) - The Ministry of Public Health is accelerating its efforts to create immunity from rabies according to the goal set with the World Heath Organization for 2020.

MOPH Permanent Secretary Sopon Mekthon revealed that 80 percent of rabies mortalities came from being bitten or scratched by their own dogs or friend’s dogs that were not vaccinated.

The Disease Control Department has therefore collaborated with the Livestock Department, Department of Local Administration and related agencies to encourage local administrations to prevent rabies infections in their communities in order to create rabies-free zones, according to the World Heath Organization initiative for the year 2020.

Pet owners are advised to vaccinate their pets and report any sign of rabies to the authorities.


-- NNT 2016-04-21

Pets are not the problem, the problem is millions diseased soi dogs (not all rabid) that need to be put down, but that nobody has the bottle to tackle.

Edited April 21, 201610 yr by thai3

Pets are not the problem, the problem is millions diseased soi dogs (not all rabid) that need to be put down, but that nobody has the bottle to tackle.

Orrrr, treating these 'diseased' dogs and heavily fining the bastards who routinely dump them at the side of the road, sometimes in bloody boxes, and of course at every BUDDHIST temple. Come on down to Wat Chalong any day of the week and watch some <deleted> in an expensive car throw the family pet out the door and speeding off to leave the poor animal bewildered, attempting to catch up with it's 'master' by running as fast as it can in amongst the traffic. Disgusting! Penalise these heartless excuses for humanity, NOW.

There they are again with their %%% calculations, wonder if they even know how to calculate % figures ?! Most dog owners I know including myself have their dogs vaccinated, as in my case not only for rabies but for heart worm, ticks, flees.......

Before the dog haters jump in let me add that I am a responsible dog owner, I do not let them roam the neighborhood, they live on our premises and are no annoyance to anybody.

Regarding the strays, there are easy solutions; example a riding vet clinic, neutering the animals, putting the old and sick one out of their misery in a human way and the problem will soon be gone.

Of course this takes some planning a budget and cooperation of certain government bodies........so I guess we know what that means? Planning....hmm ! Budget....hmm. usually that budget will have disappeared into some pockets before it reaches it's destination....

Its only just said that there is an increasing rabies problem? So basicaly one hand does not know what the other hand is doing!

Not required, advised. A crackdown on the hub of rabies? Zones? Ummmmm, how about the whole country, and attack the dog and cat problem~Jesus Lord, it's not nuclear science

Scrap the zones, just make it rabies free.

Pets are not the problem, the problem is millions diseased soi dogs (not all rabid) that need to be put down, but that nobody has the bottle to tackle.

Orrrr, treating these 'diseased' dogs and heavily fining the bastards who routinely dump them at the side of the road, sometimes in bloody boxes, and of course at every BUDDHIST temple. Come on down to Wat Chalong any day of the week and watch some <deleted> in an expensive car throw the family pet out the door and speeding off to leave the poor animal bewildered, attempting to catch up with it's 'master' by running as fast as it can in amongst the traffic. Disgusting! Penalise these heartless excuses for humanity, NOW.

There is no complete cure for dogs infected with rabies for much more than 7 days as yet.Early post infection vaccination slows the development but still leaves the dog infected. And people forget that many other animals can carry rabies. It is just that a rabid dog is the most likely to bite people. The number of people officially killed by rabies infection in the world is estimated to be a fraction of the true number. As with maleria the most effective way to initially reduce the problem is to remove the source/s.

I suspect that theThai Health Ministry has had to acknowledge the reality of the numbers of rabies deaths. In the past the statistics for deaths from diseases surveyed by the WHO have been grossly under reported.Dengue has been highlighted largely because it is less socio economically selective. Maleria kills more people in Thailand than dengue but the victims are mostly rural. Similarly with rabies.

Vaccination programs for dogs have/had been ongoing. The problem is in the application of the programs. Rabies vaccine must be kept refrigerated at all times until injected to preserve its effectiveness. Personally witnessing people coming to a village Centre and collecting pocketfulls of vials and syringes to distribute to neighbours sometime later but in the uninformed belief they are helping is quite despairing. And this vaccine is not inexpensive!

So it comes back to the seemingly harder choice of eliminating the largest source first....strays. And requiring "owned" dogs to be confined to a single property. If not permitted to scavenge ...........bye bye.

Pets are not the problem, the problem is millions diseased soi dogs (not all rabid) that need to be put down, but that nobody has the bottle to tackle.

Orrrr, treating these 'diseased' dogs and heavily fining the bastards who routinely dump them at the side of the road, sometimes in bloody boxes, and of course at every BUDDHIST temple. Come on down to Wat Chalong any day of the week and watch some <deleted> in an expensive car throw the family pet out the door and speeding off to leave the poor animal bewildered, attempting to catch up with it's 'master' by running as fast as it can in amongst the traffic. Disgusting! Penalise these heartless excuses for humanity, NOW.

Consider some those that take a dog or cat to the temple in the car may not be the "master' but have taken that course of action to rid themselves of a stray they fed out of sympathy a few times and thus it decided to stay without actual welcome. There are few options in Thailand . Soi /stray dogs grow up as their own master unless in a pack. The priority is food and territory.Territorial disputes cause fights which helps spread rabies. Adopting an adult soi dog may not be so good. The dog will be loyal to the home territory ( where the food supply is) but not so often to the "master.

I believe that although they claim that most rabies cases come from pets or friend's pets, the stray dog population is largely the cause of the transmission of the disease between animals.

The stray dog issue is a cultural problem and is ultimately borne from selfishness. Why do I say this? Most vets in Thailand will not put an animal to sleep regardless of it's condition and suffering (I have personal experience of this) because they believe it will bring bad karma to them. The condition and suffering of the animal is secondary, or perhaps not even considered, when it comes to thinking of how this will affect 'ME'.

The animal cruelty laws are all well and good, the major flaw in this in my opinion is that they should clean house first. These laws in Countries where the stray animal population have been cleaned up are valid and often required, but with so many strays wandering around and in some cases being a serious menace and danger to Children it is difficult to see how such laws can work in a fair and balanced manner when Children are being put at risk by dangerous and possibly rabid animals.