Owned Dog Ecology and Demography in Villa De Tezontepec, Hidalgo, Mexico
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Preventive Veterinary Medicine 135 (2016) 37–46 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Preventive Veterinary Medicine j ournal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/prevetmed Owned dog ecology and demography in Villa de Tezontepec, Hidalgo, Mexico a a,∗ a,b a Luz Maria Kisiel , Andria Jones-Bitton , Jan M. Sargeant , Jason B. Coe , c d e D.T. Tyler Flockhart , Alejandro Reynoso Palomar , Erick J. Canales Vargas , a Amy L. Greer a Department of Population Medicine, Ontario Veterinary College, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Rd. E, Guelph, Ontario N1G 2W1, Canada b Centre for Public Health and Zoonoses, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Rd. E, Guelph, Ontario N1G 2W1, Canada c Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Rd. E, Guelph, Ontario N1G 2W1, Canada d Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Calle 4 Sur 104, Centro Tecamachalco, Puebla C.P. 75482, Mexico e Rabies and Zoonoses Prevention Program, Servicios de Salud de Hidalgo, Plaza Vía Monta˜na, Boulevard Luis Donaldo Colosio No. 516, Col. Calabazas, Mineral de la Reforma, Hidalgo C.P. 42182, Mexico a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Dog overpopulation in developing countries has negative implications for the health and safety of people, Received 5 August 2016 including the transmission of zoonotic diseases, physical attacks and intimidation to humans and animals, Received in revised form 12 October 2016 as well as impacts on canine welfare. Understanding the ecology and demographic characteristics of a dog Accepted 27 October 2016 population can help in the planning and monitoring of canine population control programs. Little data exist regarding demography and dynamics of domestic dog populations in semi-urban areas in Mexico. Keywords: A cross-sectional study was carried out between October 21 and November 7, 2015, to characterize the Mexico dog ecology and demography in Villa de Tezontepec, Hidalgo, Mexico. A face-to-face survey was used Dog demography to collect data from randomly selected households in four contiguous communities using stratified two- Domestic dog stage cluster sampling. Within each household, adults answered questions related to their dogs and their Canine overpopulation Population management experiences with dog bites and aggression. A total of 328 households were interviewed, representing a Survey questionnaire participation rate of 90.9% (328/361) and 1,450 people. Approximately 65.2% of the households owned one or more dogs, with a mean of 1.3 (SD = 1.5) and 2.0 (SD = 1.5) owned dogs in all participant households and dog-owning households, respectively. The human: owned dog ratio for all participant households was 3.4:1 (1450/428), and for the dog-owning households was 2.3:1 (984/428). The owned dog male: female ratio was 1.4:1 (249/179). Approximately 74.4% (95.0% CI = 69.8% – 78.7%) of the owned dogs were older than one year (mean age: 2.9 years; SD = 2.5). The mean age of owned female dogs at first litter was 1.9 years (SD = 1.2) and the mean litter size was 4.2 puppies (SD = 2.1). Approximately 36.9% (95.0% CI = 31.8% – 46.4%) of the females were spayed, and 14.1% (95.0% CI = 10.7% – 19.7%) of the males were neutered. Only 44.9% (95.0% CI = 40.1% – 49.7%) were always confined when unsupervised. Approximately 84.4% (95.0% CI = 80.6% – 87.7%) were reported to have been vaccinated against rabies in 2015. The knowledge of owned dog demography and ecology provided by this study can inform local government planning of dog population control interventions, and could serve as a baseline for the development of agent-based models to evaluate the effects of different dog population control strategies on dog demography. © 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Inadequate control of dog populations can have grave conse- ∗ quences for public health and the welfare of dogs (Stafford, 2007). Corresponding author. Dogs can transmit several important zoonotic diseases to humans, E-mail addresses: [email protected] (L.M. Kisiel), [email protected] (A. Jones-Bitton), [email protected] (J.M. Sargeant), including rabies, leishmaniasis and echinococcosis (Garde et al., [email protected] (J.B. Coe), dfl[email protected] (D.T.T. Flockhart), 2013). Dogs also remain the main reservoir and vector of rabies [email protected] (A. Reynoso Palomar), to humans worldwide (Wunner and Briggs, 2010; Chomel and [email protected] (E.J. Canales Vargas), [email protected] Arzt, 2013). It is estimated that canine rabies is responsible for (A.L. Greer). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.prevetmed.2016.10.021 0167-5877/© 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 38 L.M. Kisiel et al. / Preventive Veterinary Medicine 135 (2016) 37–46 55,000 human deaths worldwide every year (Knobel et al., 2005). In bites and transmission of zoonotic diseases. The municipal govern- Mexico, there have been no reported cases of human rabies trans- ment of Villa de Tezontepec consulted with the Ministry of Health mitted by domestic dogs since 2006 (Secretaria de Salud, 2015c); regarding their dog overpopulation concerns. The present study however, 12 cases of canine rabies were confirmed during 2012 was conducted to better understand the local situation. The spe- (Dyer et al., 2014), therefore the threat for rabies transmission to cific objective of this study was to characterize the ecology and humans remains. Even in the absence of disease, dog bites are demography of the owned dog population in a Villa de Tezontepec, a major public health problem in Mexico, with 116,832 reported Hidalgo, Mexico. cases of dog-to-human bites in 2007 (Arroyo, 2009). Dogs can also cause other problems including physical aggression and intimi- 2. Materials and methods dation towards humans, noise and fouling, livestock predation, wildlife endangerment, and road traffic accidents (ICAM, 2008; A cross-sectional study was conducted in Villa de Tezontepec, Hiby, 2013; Pulczer et al., 2013). Hidalgo, Mexico, between October 21 and November 7, 2015. The It is estimated that the global abundance of domestic dogs is 700 University of Guelph Research Ethics Board approved the involve- million and 75.0% of these may be free-roaming dogs (Hughes and ment of human participants in this study (Protocol #15JL005). Macdonald, 2013). Government efforts to reduce dog population density in developing countries tend to focus on culling (Beran and 2.1. Questionnaire survey design Frith 1988; Windiyaningsih et al., 2004) and sterilization (Reece and Chawla 2006; WHO, 2013). New approaches to non-surgical A household questionnaire was designed and modified from sterilization, such as chemical castration in males, have also been Pulczer et al. (2013) and the Guide to Monitoring and Evaluat- tested and continue to be investigated (Jana and Kumar, 2007; Levy ing Dog Population Management Interventions (ICAM, 2015 pp. et al., 2008; Oliveira et al., 2012). 115–120). Part A of the questionnaire focused on household infor- An understanding of dog demography, ecology and dog own- mation, including questions about the age and gender of household ership practices and behaviors can help inform the planning, members, number of dogs owned per household, number of dogs implementation and monitoring of appropriate dog population that died or left the household in past 12 months, reasons for dog management and zoonotic disease control programs (WHO, 1987; ownership status, and plans to acquire a dog. Part B of the question- WHO/WSPA, 1990; Perry, 1993; Patronek and Rowan, 1995; naire focused on individual owned dog information and included Acosta-Jamett et al., 2010; Morters et al., 2014) and estimates of questions about each dog’s age and sex, sterilization (i.e. spay or dog abundance can help project the cost and resources needed for neuter), vaccination and confinement statuses, sources of the dog, population control interventions (Wandeler, 1985). This is espe- reasons for owning the dog, female dog reproductive history, and cially important when resources are limited. Data collected in dog whether a dog had ever bitten a person or another dog. An “owned” demography and ecology studies can also serve as a baseline against dog was defined as a dog for which a person, during the household which comparisons can be made after an intervention has been questionnaire administration, stated that they owned and could implemented to measure its effectiveness (ICAM, 2015). Informa- answer questions about the dog’s sex and age, as well as provide tion on dog population dynamics such as birth and mortality rates knowledge of the dog’s life. No formal pre-testing of the question- and demographic data such as age and sex distributions can also naire was conducted for the present study; however pre-testing be used to inform mathematical models that can be used to simu- was done for questionnaire that was used in Guatemala (Pulczer late population growth and control activities and help quantify the et al., 2013) and served as the basis of the questionnaire used here. expected effects of interventions (Coleman, 1997). The questionnaire was written in English and then translated into Limited data currently exist regarding domestic dog population Spanish by the principal author, who is a native Spanish speaker; demography and dynamics in semi-urban areas in Mexico. There local government collaborators also reviewed the Spanish transla- have been only a few studies on dog demography in urban and tion of the questionnaire prior its use. A copy of the questionnaire rural areas; these include Mexico City, (Romero-Lopez et al., 2008), in English and Spanish is included in the Supplementary materials. Mexicali, Baja California (Flores-Ibarra and Estrella-Valenzuela, 2004), Merida, Yucatan (Ortega-Pacheco et al., 2007) Atlixco, 2.2.