PESHAWAR: Stray dogs pose a threat to people on the streets across the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, including Peshawar’s posh localities like Hayatabad, University Town and Regi Model Town, amid growing dog bite incidence.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa recorded 65,267 dog bite incidents last year, according to a report compiled by the district health information system of the health department.

Director General (Health Services) Dr Mohammad Salim Khan told Dawn that anti-rabies vaccines were provided to affected people free of charge.

“Districts procure anti-rabies vaccines themselves according to their budgets,” he said.

Officials say municipal bodies have stopped culling dogs due to animal protection law

Doctors at medical teaching institutions said they often faced shortage of vaccines due to the rising dog bite cases as it was the responsibility of the municipalities to eliminate stray dogs for people’s safety.

“We receive women as well as children bitten by dogs. They’re given anti-rabies injections. In Hayatabad, the people have abandoned their morning and evening walks due to the presence of stray dogs on the streets,” a senior MTI doctor told Dawn.

He said prevention was a better strategy which wasn’t the job of hospitals but the civic bodies’.

“Some dogs happen to be very aggressive due to which the people stay home instead of walking on the streets,” he said.

A resident of Hayatabad said the population of dogs continues to rise which leads to rise in incidents of dog bites and fear among the residents subsequently. Situation is alarming because stray dogs can spread rabies, which is a significant concern for people. Most of the people have stopped walking because of the ownerless and wild dogs roaming freely in every street, he said.

Doctors at a district headquarters hospital told Dawn that in many hospitals, unavailability of anti-rabies vaccines is causing deaths.

“With the onset of the summer season, cases involving dog bites register a sharp rise which attack children and farmers,” a doctor said.

He said the cost of anti-rabies injections was also very high, so it was unaffordable for most people after many hospitals ran out of stock.

A district health officer said that on average, two dozen people, mostly children, were bitten by stray dogs daily and that they found it extremely difficult to seek treatment because government hospitals did not receive any vaccines due to the shortage of funds.

“The number of stray dogs is on the rise due to the negligence of municipal authorities. This problem has been exacerbated by the fact that strychnine - the poison used by civic bodies to eliminate stray dogs - is very expensive, while the culling exercise is quite risky,” he said.

Officials at the municipal bodies, however, said culling animals, including dogs, had been banned due to the animal protection law, so they couldn’t poison stray dogs.

They said in the past, they also struggled to dump carcasses after culling dogs as it was not an “easy task” for municipal authorities or people.

“We have also faced opposition from animal rights organisations for culling stray dogs,” an official said.

He said in given circumstances, the people could go for preventive measures only.

The official said in posh localities, the people threw kitchen waste in dustbins or in the open, inviting dogs and cats.

Meanwhile, the health department has planned to procure anti-rabies vaccines from the National Institute of Health, Islamabad, according to officials.

They said the NIH recently asked all provinces that it had enough vaccine stock, which was likely to expire, so they should send in demand for the vaccine at the earliest.

Published in Dawn, May 9th, 2025