Rabies Action Week: accelerating rabies control efforts in India

At the end of 2024, we launched Rabies Action Week, an initiative to strengthen our network across India and empower other animal welfare organisations to accelerate vaccination efforts. We gave participating organisations all of the resources they needed for a vaccination campaign, along with our support and expertise, to enable them to advance rabies control efforts in their communities.

Mission Rabies launched in 2013 in India – to demonstrate how new methods of rabies prevention could save lives. India is the world’s hotspot for rabies, with a third of all estimated human rabies deaths. Globally, rabies still claims the lives of approximately 59,000 people each year, with a staggering 20,000 of these fatalities occurring in India. According to the World Health Organization, up to 60% of rabies deaths in the country are children under the age of fifteen. This means that more children die from rabies in India than any other nation. 

In collaboration with local governments, our work in India has developed to encompass comprehensive vaccination, education and surveillance components with the country becoming a global beacon of progress. Ground-breaking progress has been made in India, with Goa being declared a ‘Rabies Controlled Area’ in 2021. The government announced that rabies had successfully been eliminated from most parts of the state, a landmark achievement setting a precedent for other states to follow. Now, we continue to expand work throughout India to end canine-mediated rabies. 

At the heart of our mission is collaboration – by working with other animal welfare charities and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and governments we can end rabies. We collaborate with governments worldwide through our International Rabies Taskforce (IRT). Working with our strategic partners, we provide practical One Health expertise, resources and guidance to support governments in planning and growing successful, cost-effective rabies eliminate strategies. Collaboration ensures that we can reach the crucial 70% vaccination coverage needed to eliminate the disease in dogs and prevent human deaths.

Collaboration was essential to our new programme, Rabies Action Week. The initiative launched in India in September 2024, with 30 organisations from across the country taking part. The team worked hard to make this programme possible. From packing vaccine doses to organising training guides, every detail was planned to help empower participants. Each organisation was sent a ‘rabies control pack’ to help start their rabies control efforts in their communities. Each pack included: rabies vaccines, cooler boxes, temperature monitor, phones with WVS Data Collection App installed, training guides, and Mission Rabies t-shirts. The training guides included information on how to vaccinate safely, vaccine storage, and other key WVS Academy resources.  

Image: Varanasi for Animals, Varanasi 

As part of Rabies Action Week, participating organisations were supplied with phones and given training on the WVS App – this is used worldwide by our global teams and other organisations to collect crucial data, including the location, of each dog vaccinated. It is a powerful tool that allows One Health initiatives to be delivered efficiently and cost-effectively. It is vital to collect data while conducting rabies vaccination campaigns, as it allows us to keep track of how many vaccines have been administered and if teams have hit the crucial 70% vaccination coverage needed for herd immunity. We can also collect other important information, like conditions of the dogs, ages, and sterilisation status, that gives us valuable data that feeds into the management of vaccination campaigns in real time.

Image: People for Animals, Bhubaneswar 

Each organisation used their rabies control pack, as well as support and guidance from our team to complete vaccination campaigns in their communities. By sharing our expertise with other organisations, we can empower them to take charge of rabies control efforts in their communities. By working together, we can vaccinate more dogs, achieve herd immunity, and stop dogs and people dying from this cruel disease. 

Image: Aastha Animal Hospital, Faridabad

Over 30 days, a total of 9,849 dogs were vaccinated against rabies by the 30 organisations involved. It was inspiring to see participants take this a step further – with many conducting education sessions and engaging communities on rabies prevention. Education is vital in the mission to end rabies, as if the risks are widely understood and appropriate dog bite treatment is well known – rabies is 100% preventable. 

We look forward to building on this project and ensuring that organisations all over India, and beyond, have the knowledge and resources to protect their communities from rabies. 

Are you an animal welfare charity or organisation in India? 

You can be involved in Rabies Action Week 2025! Register your interest here and we will be in touch with details of how you can get involved later in the year.