For decades, the country sustained vaccination campaigns, epidemiological surveillance, and the capacity to respond to a disease that had largely disappeared from everyday life. The result was the interruption of dog-mediated human rabies—a milestone achieved long before it could be formally recognized.
— September 2026 —
Generations of Chileans grew up hearing warnings about rabies and watching vaccination teams make their way through neighborhoods. For much of the 20th century, the disease posed a constant threat to people and domestic animals.
The last human case associated with the canine rabies virus variant was recorded in 1972. By the early 1990s, Chile had interrupted circulation of this variant among dogs through mass vaccination campaigns, epidemiological surveillance, and rapid response to any detected cases.
No human cases linked to rabies transmitted by dogs have been reported in Chile since then. Maintaining that achievement, however, has required a continuous effort spanning more than half a century. To understand how it was achieved, it is necessary to go back several decades.
The story began in the 1960s, when the Ministry of Health established the National Rabies Prevention and Control Program and established free mass vaccination of dogs and cats as the primary tool for interrupting transmission of the virus. Health teams traveled through urban and rural communities, vaccinating animals, house by house, while laboratories and epidemiological teams strengthened surveillance and response capacity.
Instead of focusing on a series of single interventions, breaking transmission required acting simultaneously on animals, people, and the virus. Dogs had to be vaccinated. Suspected animals had to be identified. Cases had to be confirmed in the laboratory. And people who had been exposed had to be protected quickly.
At the same time, the country strengthened care for people exposed to the virus, ensuring timely access to post-exposure prophylaxis and establishing protocols for bites and other potentially risky exposures.
Through these efforts, the course of the disease was gradually transformed, and rabies disappeared from the everyday lives of Chileans. Health authorities continued to monitor its possible reemergence.
Eliminating human rabies transmitted by dogs does not mean that rabies has disappeared. The virus continues to circulate in wildlife reservoirs, particularly bats, which are present in every country in the Region. Continued surveillance is essential to maintaining the progress achieved.
Although Chile had eliminated dog-mediated human rabies decades earlier, in 2026 the World Health Organization (WHO) officially validated the achievement after evaluating the evidence submitted by the country. Chile thus became the first country in South America and the third in the world, after Mexico and Bhutan, to receive this validation. More than symbolic recognition, the process confirms that Chile continues to maintain surveillance, prevention, and response capacities needed to sustain elimination.
“This validation is a historic achievement for the country, but it is also a commitment. We must maintain these capacities to prevent reintroduction and respond to wildlife rabies, which continues to affect us through its circulation in bats,” said Bárbara Hott, Head of the Zoonoses and Vectors Department at Chile’s Ministry of Health.
One of the challenges of elimination programs is that new generations will grow up without ever having seen the disease.
“One of the main challenges when this level of elimination is achieved is maintaining surveillance and awareness of a disease that many generations have never seen,” said Marco Vigilato, PANAFTOSA’s Coordinator for Zoonoses. “Elimination requires maintaining capacity even when cases disappear.”
Chile continues to regularly report information to the Regional Rabies Epidemiological Surveillance System (SIRVERA), coordinated by PANAFTOSA-PAHO, contributing to regional monitoring and stronger surveillance across the Americas.
Dog-transmitted human rabies continues to cause thousands of deaths each year, mainly in Asia and Africa. In the Americas, the situation has changed dramatically over the past several decades.
Thanks to mass dog vaccination campaigns, stronger epidemiological surveillance, timely access to post-exposure prophylaxis, and community participation, human cases of rabies transmitted by dogs in the Region have fallen by more than 98% since 1983.
The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and its Pan American Center for Foot-and-Mouth Disease and Veterinary Public Health (PANAFTOSA) have supported this progress through technical cooperation in epidemiological surveillance, training, and strengthening national prevention and control programs.
Chile’s experience also represents progress toward PAHO’s Disease Elimination Initiative, which seeks to accelerate the elimination of more than 30 communicable diseases and related conditions in the Americas by 2030, including dog-mediated human rabies.
To obtain WHO validation, Chile submitted decades of epidemiological evidence, historical records, technical protocols, and documentation demonstrating robust systems for surveillance, diagnosis, animal vaccination in areas at risk, and the capacity to respond to a potential reintroduction of the virus.
The information was evaluated by an international group of independent experts convened by PAHO/WHO.
The validation recognizes decades of sustained effort and confirms, based on epidemiological evidence and demonstrated capacities, that the country maintains the conditions necessary to prevent the reintroduction of the disease and respond to emerging risks.
Chile’s experience shows that eliminating rabies transmitted by dogs requires a decades-long strategy. In a Region that is moving closer and closer to achieving this goal, Chile demonstrates that a preventable disease can be stopped when vaccination, surveillance, and public health response are sustained over time.