Thiruvananthapuram, Sept. 12 -- Expanding vaccination coverage among dogs, rather than introducing routine pre-exposure rabies vaccination for children, is the most effective and cost-effective strategy to eliminate human rabies deaths in Kerala, according to a new study published in the Lancet Regional Health.
The study found that vaccinating 70 per cent of the dog population could bring annual human rabies deaths in Kerala down to near zero within around three years. In contrast, introducing routine pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for children would cost an additional USD 10 million while preventing fewer than 10 additional deaths in a state where access to post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) is already high.
The research also found that sw...