Nepal, June 24 -- year-old man from Chandragiri recently succumbed to rabies infection after failing to secure a vaccine in his locality following a bite from a puppy. When he reached the Sukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital (STIDH)-Nepal's only public hospital dedicated exclusively to treating communicable, tropical and infectious diseases-the symptoms had manifested, and his fate was sealed. Medical science has rendered rabies entirely preventable through timely post-exposure prophylaxis. A death as such is an indictment of a state that has allowed a preventable disease to become a death sentence.

For months, the country has grappled with an acute shortage of anti-rabies vaccines, a crisis that has rippled from remote dist...