Sri Lanka rabies vaccination dispute erupts between medical and veterinary professionals

The Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) has raised concerns regarding proposed legislative changes to Sri Lanka’s dog vaccination programme, warning they could disrupt rabies control efforts. The proposed law would require dogs to be vaccinated under the direct supervision of a veterinary surgeon. The GMOA argues this is impractical due to the limited number of government veterinary surgeons and could undermine the current system, which utilizes trained vaccinators across 362 Medical Officer of Health areas under the Ministry of Health.

Veterinary professionals have also expressed opposition to the GMOA’s stance. Dr. Samith Nanayakkara, spokesperson for the Veterinarians' Association for Humane Population Control, noted that while the GMOA seeks to amend the law, there is a professional distinction between human medicine and veterinary science. He emphasized that veterinarians are specifically trained to treat animal diseases and manage animal populations, whereas medical doctors are trained for human care.

Currently, Sri Lanka’s dog vaccination coverage is approximately 60%, with a target of 70%. The GMOA cited a previous instance in 2017 where transferring the programme to the Department of Animal Production and Health caused coverage to drop from over 60% to roughly 6% within a year. The association noted that human rabies deaths have decreased significantly from 350 annually in the 1970s to 14 last year, with seven deaths recorded so far in 2026.