Major Health Breakthrough: Getz Pharma, Indus Hospital team up to eliminate rabies from Karachi.

KARACHI -- Getz Pharma Pvt Ltd and Indus Hospital are entering into a strategic partnership to eradicate rabies from Karachi.

Getz Pharma will provide financial assistance, fund-raising support, and marketing expertise to Rabies Free Karachi (RFK) project of the Indus Hospital to eliminate rabies from Pakistan.

In Pakistan, it is estimated that 160,000 dog bites occur annually, resulting in almost 5000 human deaths. The 40% of the bitten victims are children. Most deaths from rabies are not reported as patients are taken to either faith healers or shrines. Compounding the issue of dog bites is the dwindling supplies of essential anti-rabies vaccine and immunoglobulin.

The vision of the RFK program is to implement an anti-rabies program by implementing the One-Health Approach recommended by World Health Organization (WHO), World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The One-Health Approach aims to eradicate Rabies universally by 2030 (#zeroby30). Killing of dogs is both cruel and ineffective, RFK and Getz Pharma believe in vaccinations of dogs and reducing dog population through surgical sterilization. After achieving success in the pilot phase, the RFK initiative is now scaling up its program to cover all of Karachi in order to eradicate the incidence of Rabies in the city. According to the RFK Program Director, Dr Naseem Salahuddin, the momentum has now become a movement to save the people from this dreaded disease. 'We are grateful to Getz Pharma for their tremendous support, and hope that other members of civil society and government institutions...