Possibility of prophylactic vaccination against rabies in children

Rabies still claims an estimated lives of 55 000 people living in Africa and Asia each year even when efficacious vaccines are available and half of the deaths are children under the age of 15. If rabies vaccination is included in the Children's Immunization Program, rabies associated mortality can surely be greatly reduced. However, based on the effectiveness and price of currently marketed rabies vaccines, the implementation of such initiative will be mainly determined by cost/effective analysis result of preventive vaccination. This paper discusses the possibility of prophylactic vaccination against rabies in children.