More than 100,000 dogs have been registered so far this year in
Beijing, bringing the total number to 703,879 from the end of last
year and giving rise to a "string of social problems", local
authorities said on Tuesday.
A spokesman with the Beijing municipal administrative office for
dog raising complained that dogs are "rivaling" human beings for
space of movement. Public complaints are on the increase about dogs
urinating in the streets and loud barking. The number of abandoned
and stray dogs is growing.
Meanwhile, attacks on human beings by dogs are also rising,
which will sometimes spread diseases, the spokesman said.
Data from the Beijing Municipal Health Bureau show that about
83,000 people have been injured by dogs from bites or scratches so
far this year, up 33.7 percent from a year earlier. Pet dogs
allowed to roam off the leash were at most to blame for the
attacks, the bureau said.
Beijing reported two rabies deaths in February and July. The two
victims, a villager in the outlying Daxing District and a chef in
the eastern Chaoyang District, refused to be vaccinated after they
were bitten by stray dogs.
Last year, 140,000 Beijingers sought medical attention after
they were attacked by dogs or cats.
Rabies is an acute viral infection that is nearly always fatal
if left untreated. It can be transmitted by the bite of an infected
animal, usually a dog. It kills about 50,000 people across the
world each year.
Beijing introduced a "one family, one dog" policy last year and
joined a nationwide campaign against unregistered dogs last year,
when 3,070 people in China died of rabies.
Rabies has stayed at the top of the list of fatal infectious
diseases in China for more than a year and claimed 1,043 lives
across the country in the first five months of this year.
The Beijing Municipal Health Bureau has set up 94 clinics to
administer rabies vaccinations in the city.
(Xinhua News Agency August 8, 2007)