World Rabies Day outreach to Asia: empowering people through education.

In its first two years of implementation, (2007 and 2008), the World Rabies Day initiative has proven to be an extremely effective focal point around which to increase global educational awareness about how to prevent rabies. World Rabies Day has been endorsed by a multinational group of global stakeholders including international health organizations, national governments, educational institutions, NGOs and industry, as well as those individuals living at daily risk of exposure. In 2007, 75% of all reported participants in World Rabies Day activities came from Asian countries. In 2008, 22 Asian countries participated in World Rabies' Day activities and the number of animals reported to be vaccinated in association with World Rabies Day reached nearly 617,000 in Asia alone. Personal accounts from individual event coordinators demonstrated the dimensions of the growing campaign throughout Asia. The manuscript will provide a review of outreach conducted to the continent of Asia for the first two World Rabies Day initiatives.