It’s quite possible that you could work your entire life in practice and never see a rabies case – provided that you live in the right part of the world. If you happen to be based in Africa or Asia, however, the story is very different. Across these two continents, over 50,000 people die annually from this unpleasant disease – and it is very unpleasant. Death by rabies is slow and painful, for both humans and animals.

In November, the World Health Organisation declared Mexico to be the first country to be fully rabies free. They achieved this in large part through free mass-vaccination campaigns for dogs, as well as continuous surveillance and public awareness-raising campaigns for a timely diagnosis. It took nearly three decades, but it was successful. This proves that rabies is a problem that can be solved with diligence and planning.

We have a webinar all about the problem of rabies in the developing world, and how it can be treated. This session was presented by Sarah Cleaveland, a veterinary epidemiologist based at the University of Glasgow, who leads an inter-disciplinary One Health research programme in East Africa. Her PhD and post-doctoral research focused on rabies, investigating reservoir dynamics, burden of disease and the design of control measures, contributing to the development of strategies for global canine rabies elimination. While still engaged with operational rabies research and policy, her research in Tanzania now also addresses other neglected disease problems affecting human and animal health, livelihoods and wildlife conservation.

Prof. Cleaveland is involved in several graduate training programmes and One Health capacity-strengthening initiatives with partner institutions across East and West Africa. She was a founding director of the Alliance for Rabies Control. In 2014 she was awarded an OBE for services to veterinary epidemiology and in 2016 was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society.

This session primarily addressed the Global Strategic Plan, which was developed to target the elimination of dog-mediated rabies by the year 2030.