By Dr Julie Garnier | Project Leader
We have just returned from the Drarga region in the argan Biosphere reserve where - thanks to your support - we have initiated One Health education sessions with nearly 100 women and 140 children from four villages.
“I wished you’d come earlier to tell us what to do when bitten by a dog” said one mother whose child had been badly bitten by a feral dog. We explained them how to prevent rabies -the deadliest zoonotic disease - and two other very serious zoonoses. We also told them exactly what to do when stung by a scorpion. This was timely as four women actually died from scorpion stings when collecting argan fruits two weeks ago.
Each session lasted nearly two hours and women were overwhelmed with what they heard, interacting a lot with the One Health team. In fact, we have just heard that they have already started to relay all the information we gave them to other women in the associations who could not attend the session.
On World Rabies Day on 28th September, we realized how much impact our One Health education sessions had on the children through the drawing competition we organized. It was simply amazing to see some children drawing beautiful and healthy argan forests as a source of a healthy life, or other children drawing the transmission cycle of rabies in the most perfect way.
Our fantastic vet team with 10 students from Institute Agronomique et Vétérinaire Hassan II in Rabat vaccinated domestic dogs in four villages, going from house to house and raising awareness on rabies. It was surprising to hear that some dog owners were not even aware of the risks of rabies.
This first campaign was just the beginning as we have more health modules to develop and plenty more villages to reach. We will also launch a multi-disciplinary study on the canine dog population in this ecosystem shortly. But the results are already there… and Amazigh women are eagerly awaiting our return.
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
Support this important cause by creating a personalized fundraising page.
Start a Fundraiser