Owned and Free-Roaming Dogs in the North West of Tunisia: Estimation, Characteristics and Application for the Control of Dog Rabies

Abstract

Understanding the structure of dog population and the evaluation of accessibility of dogs to vaccination is essential to succeed the fight against dog rabies and to adapt the strategy of its control. We studied the characteristics of the unowned and owned dogs using the marking method during a rabies vaccination campaign in a randomly selected sectors (urban and rural sites) in the north west of Tunisia. During a door-to-door vaccination campaign data on owned dogs were collected to describe the owned population dog. A photographic-recapture method was used to characterize and to estimate the size of the unowned dogs. A total of 1432 households accounting 5403 inhabitants was interviewed during the survey (1298 (90.6%) in the urban site and 134 (9.3%) in the rural site). The dog-owning households were significantly higher in the rural site (76.1% (102/134)) compared to the urban site (17.7% (231/1298)) (P<0.000000). Of the 17.7% dog-owning households in urban site, 58.4% owned one dog and 9% between 4 and 8 dogs. While, of the 76.1% dog-owning households in rural site, 24.5% owned one dogs and 32.3% owned between 4 and 10 dogs. The dog: human ratio was 1:11 in the urban site and 1:1.6 in the rural site. The dog population density was high in the urban site (16 dogs/km2) compared to the rural site (4 dogs/km2). The confinement practices varied significantly among the urban and the rural sites (P<0.000000). The percentage of free-roaming owned dogs was higher in the rural site (51.1%) compared to the urban site (31.4%). The majority of owned dogs in the urban site were confined (66.6%). The majority of dogs in the rural sites were born in the house, although, a high percentage (56.7%) of owned dogs in the urban site were adopted from neighbours, others sectors or countries. The vaccination coverage findings indicated that 77.8% and 84.2% of the owned dog were vaccinated in the urban and rural sites, respectively. The estimated size of the free-roaming dogs was 72 dogs in the urban site (Kalaat Senan) and 16 dogs in the rural site (Sod el Khir).