RESEARCH ARTICLE Household survey on owned dog population and rabies knowledge in selected municipalities in Bulacan, Philippines: A cross- sectional study Timothy John R. Dizon ID 1☯ *, Nobuo Saito 2,3☯ , Marianette Inobaya 1 , Alvin Tan 1 , Mark Donald C. Reñosa 1 , Thea Andrea Bravo 1 , Vivienne Endoma 1 , Catherine Silvestre 1 , Micah Angela O. Salunga 2 , Patricia Mae T. Lacanilao ID 2 , Jerric Rhazel Guevarra 1 , Yasuhiko Kamiya ID 3 , Maria Glofezita O. Lagayan ID 3,4 , Kazunori Kimitsuki ID 2 , Akira Nishizono 2 , Beatriz P. Quiambao 1 1 Research Institute for Tropical Medicine, Muntinlupa City, Metro Manila, Philippines, 2 Department of Microbiology, Oita University Faculty of Medicine, Yufu, Oita, Japan, 3 School of Tropical Medicine & Global Health, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki, Nagasaki, Japan, 4 Bureau of Animal Industry, Department of Agriculture, Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. * timothy.dizon@ritm.gov.ph Abstract Background Despite the effort to eradicate rabies in the Philippines, human rabies cases have not decreased in the past decade. Rabid dogs pose the most significant hazard in the countries with the highest burden of rabies, and 70% rabies vaccine coverage is recommended for dogs in high-risk areas. Ascertaining the owned dog population and community knowledge on rabies can help improve vaccine coverage and information campaigns. Methodology/Principal findings We conducted a cross-sectional survey in six randomly selected communities (five urban, one rural) in Central Luzon, Philippines. We first conducted the complete mapping of 9,173 households and then randomly selected 727 households. More than half (54.1%) of the households owned dogs (1.21 dogs/household). In the 727 households, we identified 878 owned dogs and 3256 humans. According to these results, the dog-to-human ratio was approximately 1:3.7. Only 8.8% of households reported a history of dog bite in 2019. Among dog-owning households, 31% reported that they allow their dogs to roam freely. Of the recorded dogs, 35.9% have never been vaccinated, and only 3.5% were spayed or cas- trated. Factors associated with lower rabies knowledge include (1) no education aOR: 0.30 (0.16–0.59), and (2) only primary school education aOR: 0.33 (0.22–0.49). In contrast, fac- tors associated with higher knowledge include (1) owning a dog and not allowing them to roam freely aOR: 2.01 (1.41–2.87) and (2) owning a dog and allowing them to roam freely aOR: 1.84 (1.17–2.92), when compared to those with no dogs. PLOS NEGLECTED TROPICAL DISEASES PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0009948 January 18, 2022 1 / 18 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 OPEN ACCESS Citation: Dizon TJR, Saito N, Inobaya M, Tan A, Reñosa MDC, Bravo TA, et al. (2022) Household survey on owned dog population and rabies knowledge in selected municipalities in Bulacan, Philippines: A cross-sectional study. PLoS Negl Trop Dis 16(1): e0009948. https://doi.org/10.1371/ journal.pntd.0009948 Editor: Jose ´ Reck, Jr., Instituto de Pesquisas Veterinarias Desiderio Finamor, BRAZIL Received: May 6, 2021 Accepted: October 25, 2021 Published: January 18, 2022 Peer Review History: PLOS recognizes the benefits of transparency in the peer review process; therefore, we enable the publication of all of the content of peer review and author responses alongside final, published articles. The editorial history of this article is available here: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0009948 Copyright: © 2022 Dizon et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability Statement: All relevant data are within the manuscript and its Supporting Information files.