Baseline Surveillance on Rabies in Sylhet and Rangpur Division in Bangladesh
Muhammed Hossain*, Md. Jamal Uddin Bhuiyan
The baseline surveillance on rabies in Sylhet was evaluated for the first time and in Rangpur division was checked for the second time in Bangladesh from June 2014 to January 2015. A semi-structured questionnaire was applied on total of 600 respondents including common people, school teachers, people’s representatives, political leaders, doctors, nurses and medical technicians from selected households. Of the respondents on average 91% know about rabies and regionally 93% in Sylhet division and 89% in Rangpur division. This survey highlighted education is a key of awareness about rabies and the level of educated people found higher in Sylhet (96.33%) than Rangpur (88.33%). Still the practice of traditional healer use comparatively higher in Rangpur than Sylhet, and which is 8.8% and 5.13% respectively. Almost 100% of the respondents of different categories seek treatment of rabies from the hospital. Majority of them know about the fatality of rabies and believed that rabies could be prevented by vaccination program. Given these findings, there is a clear need for specific educational initiatives involving the local population and the public health entities, with the primary aim of contributing to the prevention of rabies.
