Vaccination protects animal and human health and reduces the economic burden of preventable cases: rabies in vaccinated dogs and cats (2002-2022).

Rabies vaccine failures in domestic animals can have severe public health consequences and are not consistently publicized. This study describes trends in rabies vaccine failures among dogs and cats in the US reported to the CDC's National Rabies Surveillance System between 2002 and 2022 to characterize the efficacy of rabies vaccines and evaluate the economic and public health burdens of nonvaccination. Thirty-nine of 1,525 rabid dogs (2.56%) and 30 of 5,530 rabid cats (0.54%) were documented as having a history of rabies vaccination, and 15 true vaccine failures (11 dogs and 4 cats) were identified among these during the study period. Dogs and cats with up-to-date vaccination were 130.8 and 93.6 times less likely, respectively, to contract rabies than nonvaccinated counterparts. Current rabies vaccination practices will likely prevent $166 million in public health- and healthcare-related costs over the following 10 years; high rates of rabies vaccination in dogs and cats in the US greatly reduce medical costs for the human health sector. Effective coordination between local and national surveillance is essential for assessing epidemiological patterns in animal rabies cases, including vaccination failures. The companion Currents in One Health by Payette-Stroman et al, AJVR, October 2025, addresses patterns of domestic rabies burden in livestock.