Epidemiology Investigation And Prevention Of Rabies In Guangxi From2006to2010

Rabies is a highly fatal zoonotic infectious disease caused by the rabies virus. The mortality of the disease is extremely high with nearly100%deaths. Rabies viruses are usually transmitted by a bite from an infected mammal and violate both animal and human nervous systems. In recent years, the death toll of rabies has been the top of all important infectious diseases in China. Guangxi is one of the most important epidemic areas of rabies with high morbidity in China. Hence, investigation and understanding of the prevalence of rabies in Guangxi and development of effective prevention and control measures become an urgent problem for prevention and control of rabies in this region. Investigation and analysis results of cases of rabies infected in dogs and people from2006to2010showed that the number of rabies cases and its morbidity dropped year by year, with the minimum (303cases) in2010. Canine rabies epidemic is also a similar situation. The vaccination rate of dog rabies decreased gradually (with the minimum of50.60%in2009), but it did not rise up to over70%until2010. Through sampling,1,488brain tissue specimens were collected from dogs with healthy appearance. Findings of RT-PCR showed that2.55%of dogs with healthy appearance carry the rabies virus in Guangxi.Analysis in SPSS showed that:morbidity of human rabies correlated positively with that of dog rabies; and there was a negative correlation between vaccination of dogs and population density of dogs or between population density of dogs and agricultural population ratio. The population density of rural dogs had a downside, but the number of rural dogs raised still account for over90%of the total number of animals raised. Due to a majority of rural dogs unattended, mostly stocking, the number of dogs and their stocking increase the chances of the dog bites so that over90%of cases of rabies are prevalent in rural population. Moreover, large population and high population density of dogs lead to difficult vaccination of them while low vaccination rate increases the chances of infection of rabies virus in both dogs and people. This study suggests three different regions classified according to the prevalence of rabies in Guangxi, namely, mountainous region, hilly region and mixed region. According to different regional characteristics, to finally decrease the chances of human rabies, only further studies and development of suitable prevention and control measures for rabies in the appropriate region and strict management and vaccination of rural dogs can control the morbidity of rabies.