Children are at high risk of dog bites and contacting rabies. Forty percent of reported rabies cases worldwide are children under the age of fifteen. In our project areas the paediatric proportion is often even higher. Rabies most often persists in poor communities and rural regions of developing countries in Africa and Asia. If the risks are widely understood and appropriate dog bite treatment is well known – rabies is 100% preventable. Mass canine vaccination will rid an area of rabies, but this takes time during which communities remain at risk – whilst we work to eliminate the disease, education helps us save lives.
The educational sessions are aimed to empower children, their teachers and their families with the knowledge to protect themselves from bites, preventing rabies and save lives in Malawi and India and have been adapted to be taught in US schools and colleges.
The education pack not only includes the core lessons (rabies is serious, how to be safe around dogs, first aid & community protection and dog population management) but also an introductory lesson especially for the USA, additional material, added interactive contents, worksheets and extension exercises to meet the needs of learning in a UK school or further education college. The USA based lessons are aimed, not only to inform people about the rabies disease, but also about life, language and culture in sub-Saharan Africa and India.
