Assessment of stray dog counting and knowledge, attitudes, and practice to wards rabies in households in Addis Ababa city, Ethiopia
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Date
2024
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Addis Abeba University
Abstract
Rabies is a fatal viral disease of animals and people. Dogs are the primary source of infection and the majority of human rabies cases result from dog bites. Information on both domestic and stray dog populations along Knowledge Attitude Practice (KAP) assessment regarding rabies is vitally important for rabies control. However the situation of rabies is poorly known in Ethiopia, mainly in urban areas. Therefore, this study aimed to assess the demography of stray dogs, the incidence of dog bites, and the knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP) of society concerning rabies. Questionnaire survey was collected from November, 2023 to May, 2024 using Kobo Collect toolbox in selected sub city Gulele, Yeka and Arada in order to assess KAP of the respondents towards rabies in ouseholds. In the survey, out of 384 households (96.35%) of households owned at least one dog with a total number of 463 dogs (range: 1 to 5 dogs per household); the mean number of dogs per household was 1.25 (SE 0.58). From this 96.35% of dog owning households 51.2% of respondents, owned only one
dog with dog: human ratio of 1:9. 70% of dog owning households have vaccinated their dogs against rabies. Nearly all (99%) of the respondents recognized the right response regarding the route of rabies transmission and had heard of rabies. However, 64.3% of research participants had a satisfactory level of suitable rabies prevention practices score, whereas 61.8% of individuals had a moderate level of knowledge and 59.8% had an intermediate level of attitude. In this study, even though the study participants have moderate knowledge, attitude and practice towards rabies, the dog bite management and dog vaccination practice is unsatisfactory on the last three years. Age, occupation, and the source of rabies information were all significantly correlated with knowledge score (P<0.05). The counting method was by using photo capturing method and by observation. In this study, male dogs were higher than female dogs. The total dog estimation of Gulele, Arada and Yeka sub cities had estimate 1050,783, 1282 respectively. There is huge population of stray dog in the studied sites which
may serve as a risk for maintaining and transmission of rabies. Along the set of study objectives, the RabiCare android app was developed to create awareness on transmission, prevention and control of rabies in three most spoken languages.
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Keywords
Addis Ababa, Attitude, Knowledge, Practice, Rabies, Stray dog demography