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Published Date: 2012-06-18 18:20:01
Subject: PRO/AH/EDR> Rabies - Israel: travel alert
Archive Number: 20120618.1172172

RABIES - ISRAEL: TRAVEL ALERT
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Date: Sun 17 Jun 2012
Source: Zeenews.india.com [edited]
http://zeenews.india.com/news/health/health-news/israeli-visitors-to-india-to-get-anti-rabies-jab_17472.html

Israel's Health Ministry has said that its nationals travelling to India should be vaccinated prophylactically against rabies. The Ministry's recommendation came after a report that a woman who returned to England from India died after being bitten by a rabid dog [in India]. She did not seek preventive treatment after being bitten, the Jerusalem Post reported (and see also ProMED-mail's archived reports below. - Mod.CP).

The recommendation is also applicable to anyone travelling to other distant areas, such as in jungles or treks in places too remote to receive preventive care. The shots are available at clinics for those travelling abroad.

Meanwhile, the ministry has also instructed all dog owners in the country to make sure that their dogs are vaccinated, after a dog in the southwestern part of a village near Moshav Odem, on the northern Golan Heights, was found to be positive for rabies.

The ministry asks that tourists and travellers on the Golan Heights be informed about the incident.

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[This travel alert appears to be a delayed response to the death in London U.K. of a woman recently returned from India who had contact with a rabies-infected puppy and had not received appropriate post-exposure treatments. Subsequent to this incident, the World Health Organisation (WHO) issued a travel alert warning visitors to India of risk of exposure to rabies virus infection and recommending pre-travel vaccination.

Subsequent correspondence in ProMED-mail concerning estimation of rabies mortality in India indicated that the incidence of human cases of rabies in India has been greatly overestimated, and the level of enhanced risk of exposure in India cannot be clearly defined at present. - Mod.CP]

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