The World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH, founded as OIE) Regional Representation for Asia and the Pacific (RRAP) in collaboration with Karnataka Veterinary, Animal, and Fisheries Sciences University (KVAFSU), India, organized the first meeting of the South Asia Rabies Laboratory Network (SA-RABNET) on 6 April, held virtually. A total of 22 attendees, including 14 participants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka attended the meeting.
During the meeting, a series of presentations were made on topics such as introduction of rabies laboratory network for South Asia; Terms of Reference (ToR) for South Asia Rabies Laboratory Network, and role WOAH Reference Laboratory for Rabies (KVAFSU) for regional synergies. The Members unanimously selected Bhutan as the Chair and Nepal as the Co-Chair of the Network for a period of one year. The Chair and Co-Chair then led the Network meeting in line with the ToR of the Network with support of WOAH and KVAFSU.
The meeting recommended strengthening the animal rabies surveillance in South Asia through enhancing laboratory diagnostic capacity and information sharing amongst the Members. Some of the follow-up actions to be taken up by Members included shipping brain samples to WOAH Reference Laboratory in India for molecular and phylogenetic analysis, submitting interests for laboratory twinning programs on rabies, and enhancing rabies diagnosis in animals. WOAH and KVAFSU were recommended to provide technical/financial support to Members in supply of diagnostic reagents, conducting additional hands-on training to build up critical mass of trained veterinarians/diagnosticians, and technology transfer of the in-house direct rapid immunohistochemistry tests to countries.
The next Network meeting is to be held in six months followed by a physical meeting in one year (depending on fund availability).
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