Survey dataset for assessing the knowledge, attitude, and practices regarding rabies in two selected areas of KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa

The research was designed to answer the following questions:

I. What is the attitude of the respondents towards rabies disease?

II. How knowledgeable are the respondents towards rabies?

III. What practices with potential to help prevent outbreaks of rabies have the respondents adopted?

A cross-sectional questionnaire-based survey was conducted to collect the data from a randomly selected sample of respondents from two areas namely, Embo (a rural area) and Verulam (an urban area), in KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa. The data shows low levels of knowledge of rabies among the respondents. In addition, although, in some respects, the respondents displayed a good attitude towards rabies, the data shows that there is room for improvement. Finally the data was able to demonstrate the socio-demographic characteristics that are significantly correlated with a high knowledge score among the respondents. The high prevalence of poor practices with respect to rabies, suggests that the target population is vulnerable to rabies outbreaks.