The Department of Health (DOH) in cooperation with the Department of Agriculture (DA), led the celebration of World Rabies Day with the theme : “Rabies: Educate. Vaccinate. Eliminate.”  It emphasizes the two crucial actions that our community can do to prevent rabies.  It also reflects the global target to completely remove all human deaths caused by dog-mediated rabies by 2030.

Despite that all of our dogs lived with us inside our house and the fact that they were all clean, dog rabies is something that we should now take for granted.  According to Sheila Crisostomo in an article published on the Philippine Star on March 2015, 300 to 400 Filipinos die of rabies every year.  With dog bites, there are 84 percent of human rabies cases and in an estimated nine million dogs across the country, only one million are vaccinated against rabies.

Rabies is a deadly disease transmitted to humans through animal bites and even scratches commonly by dogs.  It is prevented by a vaccine, but once it is infected, death is certainly to happen.