New Horizons for Rabies Vaccines and Vaccination Strategies: Addressing 2030 Elimination Targets for Canine-mediated Rabies

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue of vaccines will be devoted to exploring new concepts in rabies vaccine development and utilization. Particular emphasis will be placed on innovations that hold the promise of improving vaccine uptake, efficacy, or effectiveness in ways to hasten progress toward the global health community’s stated goal of elimination of canine-mediated human rabies deaths by 2030. The implementation of effective canine vaccination programs has long been demonstrated to be the most cost-effective means of preventing human rabies deaths, but implementing successful programs in resource-limited countries has proven to be a chronic challenge. New ideas for optimizing and customizing canine vaccination campaign micro-plans, as well as further development of validated methods for enumerating canine population sizes and for efficiently vaccinating roaming dogs, are urgently needed. An additional tool of importance for diminishing the burden of rabies in the canine population would be a vaccine with the potential to engender enduring immunity—and possibly suppress reproduction — in canines. Improved, less-costly human pre- and post-exposure vaccines and biologics (or less protracted immunization schedules) would also contribute to decreasing the number of global human rabies deaths, as would the application of well-coordinated surveillance programs of bite-case management. Contributions to this Special Issue are anticipated to address a broad range of conceptual and practical issues related to how novel approaches to rabies vaccine development and utilization can promote the elimination of canine-mediated human rabies deaths across the globe.

Dr. Mary Reynolds
Dr. Victoria A. Olson
Guest Editors

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