TY  - GEN
AU  - Lauigan, Kaezel A.
AU  - Soriano, Jonas George (Chairperson)
AU  - Dumo, Napoleon C. (Institutional Partner)
AU  - Caratiquit, Reygene M. (External Expert)
TI  - Responsible pet ownership in achieving a rabies-free barangay Ballay in the municipality of Bauang, La Union
KW  - Rabies
KW  - Prevention and control
KW  - Transmission
KW  - Public health
KW  - Philippines
N1  - Graduate School of Public and Development Management
N2  - Rabies remains to be a public health problem in the Philippines. Dogs are the source of the vast majority of human rabies deaths. Government programs have already been launched spanning for decades but prevalence lowering has been slow. The latest effort by the health sector on this particular illness has been set gain to year 2016 for its elimination. Responsible Pet Ownership is a strategy adopted to prevent the spread of rabies, and part of which is a target of 70% dog anti-rabies vaccination coverage and practice of leashing or caging. Bauang, a first class municipality in La Union, had an increasing number of rabies exposure cases for the past three years, with one of its barangay, Ballay, having a laboratory-confirmed canine rabies case.  An interview-schedule questionnaire was used to determine the current status of the practice of responsible pet ownership. In parallel, interventions on dog vaccination and leashing were implemented to determine its impact on decreasing animal bite and rabies cases.  The study was bale to identify that people are knowledgeable but has poor practice of responsible pet ownership, with priority given to the submission of their pets for anti-rabies vaccination. Implementation of responsible pet ownership had an impact in decreasing animal bite cases in the barangay, with no canine or human rabies case reported. Inadequate rabies program was also noted. Equal importance should also be given to dog population control strategies so as to curb the major source of rabies.  Given the nature of the disease cycle, policy recommendation will be focused on still improving the dog vaccination coverage and implementation of dog population control strategies. Advocacies and strategies should be further improved and continued with local and municipal involvement, support and commitment through a stronger ordinance implementation
ER  -