The Lagos State Government and the public seem not to be conscious of the grievous health implications of stray dogs and improperly reared pets. Many people, young and old, have met their untimely deaths from rabid dog attacks. The most recent case is that of a five-year-old boy, Jomiloju Odukomaiya, bitten while returning from a store in the neighbourhood where he had gone to buy biscuits at Rufus Olaniyan Estate in the Ikorodu area of the state.
Following the tragedy, his mother, Patience, lost her marriage. The enraged husband chased her out of their matrimonial home and took her two other children away to Ibadan, Oyo State, where he works. The housewife is miserable, screaming for succour: “My family is destroyed and a relationship of 10 years shattered. I want people to help me seek justice because I have nobody.”
Like Jomiloju, Aishat Opakunle, 21, and Jame Makwa, 14, had died in similar circumstances in 2014, bitten by the same dog at Mologede Estate, Meiran, Lagos Mainland. There are countless cases of such fatalities.
But Saturday Akpomose, a commercial bus driver, attacked by seven dogs in Ajah, and Omonigho Abraham, a four-year-old boy, whose skull was ripped open in Igando, Lagos, may have survived their own attacks. They nevertheless, underscore the broken nature of our public health policy, especially in a megacity like Lagos. But for the financial assistance from Lagos and Delta state governments and non-governmental organisations as well as media support that enabled Omonigho’s family to fly him to India for treatment, he may not have survived his own assault.
This is evident in his father’s (Odia) testimony: “While one physician was attached to him in Nigeria, six physicians were attached to him in India. We really need to upgrade our health institutions.”
Rabies is a viral disease, which attacks the central nervous system of humans and animals. Transmitted through bite and saliva of an infected animal, it kills in a matter of weeks. Dogs are major vectors of the disease in our own society, just as bats, jackals, wolves are, among others. Symptoms of the disease include severe fever, barking, muscle spasm, hydrophobia (fear of water), depression, confusion, painful swallowing etc.
Lagos is not the only state where the lives of citizens are endangered by mad and vicious dogs on the prowl. A National Youth Service Corps member, Loretta Okoro, was attacked this month by three dogs belonging to her employer in Bayelsa State, where she was posted for her primary assignment. It is obvious that these dogs were not leashed.
A quick public health response is needed, especially in Lagos, where this menace has become rampant. The strategy adopted by the Association of Reproductive and Family Health in tackling tuberculosis – a major public health concern – with its house-to-house search, which yielded 50,000 new cases in 22 states, in the first six months of this year, could help.
Such a measure by local councils could determine the number of residents that rear dogs and the health regulations they comply with in doing so. For a country where regard for rules or maintaining standards is observed in the breach, the outcome of such a survey could be very revealing: that most dogs are not vaccinated annually against rabies, nor put in hygienic enclosures and leashed. A dog vaccinated will be protected against rabies for one year. Elsewhere, rabid dogs are immediately culled. A rabid dog should never have the opportunity to strike, even once.
Unbridled influence of Western culture has seen many Nigerians adopting the fad of owning Alsatian dogs and other dangerous varieties, either as pets or for personal security. In some cases, the dogs are reared for commercial purposes. This is why puppies are openly hawked under Otedola Bridge, Lagos–Ibadan Expressway, near Alausa, Ikeja, the capital of the state, and other strategic locations. But penalising those who are not compliant with set standards in the handling of dogs could enforce sanity, as well as boost the revenue generation of councils.
However, for this campaign to be effective, the state government should first heed the call of the Nigeria Veterinary Medical Association, Lagos State chapter, to review extant laws on dog ownership, so as to enthrone responsible behaviour. The state chairman of the NVMA, Alao Mobolaji, says, “The existing dog law in Lagos State is obsolete and cannot effectively ensure responsible dog ownership. It was first enacted in 1943 and last reviewed in 1964 before vaccine for dogs against rabies was discovered.” If this is the prevailing legal environment in a place like Lagos, then the situation in other states could be unimaginable.
While marking the 2016 World Rabies Day, Mobolaji lamented that cases of rabies-related deaths from dog bites occur every year. This could be of epidemic proportions country-wide, considering the fact that Nigeria has only one well-equipped rabies diagnostic centre in the National Veterinary Research Institute, Vom, in Jos, Plateau State.
Local councils should be alive to their responsibilities by ensuring that stray dogs are arrested and their owners penalised. Residents should report neighbours who do not leash their dogs to the police. The World Health Organisation says that 59,000 people die from rabies annually, especially in Africa and Asia.
Indeed, rabies should be feared because the moment the clinical signs begin to manifest, they are not reversible. This means death!
