Rabies Kills Six in Sulawesi
I was only writing the other day about Rabies and how a child in Bandung died after being bit a rabid dog, and how most dogs in Java were culled if I could use that term. A better word would be massacred but I won't write that.
I am unaware of a sure-fire vaccine for Rabies but it seems there must be because in North Sulawesi the government has prepared a large supply of vaccine to curb the disease after at least 80 people have been infected with rabies in the Minahasa regency and six recorded deaths from frothy mouthed woofers.
According to the Animal Husbandry Officer in Minahasa’s regent capital, Tondano, the rabies virus has obviously spread to a number of areas in Minahasa and that rabies could spread to a wider area if not curbed immediately and even further to reach remote villages away from the attention of medical workers. Statistics from the region show that in 2005 at least 294 cases of dog bites were recorded in Minahasa, 198 of which were diagnosed as positive rabies infections.
In western countries if our beloved pet dog becomes ill then he is whisked off to the Vet yelping. In Indonesia the dogs are yelping from people chasing them bent on annihilating the sods. So when you are in the far reaches and away from the cities and a cool looking dog saunters up to you with a frothy mouth, don't naturally assume he has just finished sipping a capuccino!.