KARACHI, Dec 8: Some experts have expressed concern over the rising incidents of dog-bite cases in the country. They also spoke at length of the demise of patients due to inadequate wound management facilities and poor quality of vaccines being supplied to the public hospitals.

Addressing a joint press conference at the PMA house on Monday evening, Dr Habibur Rahman Soomro of the Pakistan Medical Association, Dr Nasim Salahuddin, Prof S. Tipu Sultan of Dow Medical College and Dr Sabiha and Dr Nayyar of Help Line Trust revealed that National Institute of Health, Islamabad, still produced and distributed Sheep Brain Vaccine (SBV) for 90,000 persons with dog bites per year. The vaccine was declared obsolete and discarded by the WHO in the 1980s.

According to them, 30 dog-bite cases take place daily in Karachi where the total number of stray dogs has been estimated to be more than 100,000. Despite the high number of dog-bite cases, the treatment facilities for the patients is available at only three to four hospitals of the city.

They said SBV, first produced in 1911, had been discarded after severe reactions and failure had been observed, adding that the WHO had recommended use of tissue culture rabies vaccines which proved safe.— APP