The Veterinary Services Department today declared Perlis, Kedah and Penang to have recovered from the mad dog disease or rabies.

Its director-general Dr Kamaruddin Md Isa said the three states had been infected since Sept 21.

“Since that date, there have been no new cases detected and we took into consideration the 14-day incubation period of the disease.

“From the last case until today, there were three cycles of incubation period and no cases were found before we decided to declare rabies in the three states as resolved,” he told a news conference in Putrajaya.

Also present was his deputy Dr Quaza Nizamuddin Hassan Nizam.

Rabies cases were first detected in Perlis on Augt 19, and spread to Kedah and Penang, one day later, which forced the agriculture and agro-based industries ministry to declare the three states as rabies-infected areas.

Asked why these states were not declared free from rabies, Kamaruddin said Malaysia needed to prove there were no rabies cases for two years for the ‘free’ status, in line with the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) standard.

“If there are no cases up to the end of 2017, then Malaysia can present a report to OIE for the purpose,” he said, adding that the last time Malaysia obtained the rabies-free status was in 2013.

Kamaruddin said from the day rabies infection was detected until Oct 31, 11,298 dogs had been vaccinated of which 6,506 were in Kedah.

The effort to control rabies involved 32,319 awareness campaigns being carried out, with the majority involving house-to-house visits, he said.

- Bernama