14th ICID - Poster Abstracts - International Society for Infectious ...

When citing these abstracts please use the following reference:
Author(s) of abstract. Title of abstract [abstract]. Int J Infect Dis 2010;14S1: Abstract number.
Please note that the official publication of the International Journal of Infectious Diseases 2010, Volume 14, Supplement 1
is available electronically on http://www.sciencedirect.com
Final Abstract Number: 34.014
Session: Zoonoses and Infectoins in Animals
Date: Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Time: 12:30-13:30
Room: Poster & Exhibition Area/Ground Level
Type: Poster Presentation
Emerging and zoonotic disease risk mitigation: Rabies prevention as a template for best practices
C. Hanlon 1 , S. Moore 1 , R. J. Rudd 2 , S. J. Wong 2
1 Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, USA, 2 New York State Department of Health, Albany,
NY, USA
Background: Like many zoonotic and emerging diseases, rabies prevention requires the
cooperation of animal control, law enforcement, natural resource personnel, veterinarians,
diagnosticians, public health professionals, physicians, and other professionals. Despite the
forced extinction of dog-to-dog types of rabies viruses in most of Europe and the Americas, the
recent translocation of dogs from Puerto Rico, Thailand, India, and Iraq, which developed rabies
from their places of origin upon movement into the United States, demonstrates the risk of human
travel and movement of animals, some of which can be mitigated through carefully crafted
requirements. While the methods for measuring immunity to rabies and for diagnosis are
powerful, they include some limitations innate to biological assays.
Methods: For example, we report the results of an inter-laboratory comparison of rabies serology
by Kansas State University (KSU) and the New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH). Of
90 samples presented blinded, 37 were from rabies vaccinated individuals and 53 were from
patients sero-positive for other pathogens.
Results: Among sera from vaccinated persons, 87% yielded concordant results of 0.50 IU/ml.
A discordant result occurred in 5 samples at or near 0.50 IU/ml. Among 53 samples from nonrabies-vaccinated
humans, a low level of neutralizing activity was reported by NYSDOH in 21
samples and by KSU in 9 samples, most likely indicative of nonspecific antiviral activity or crossreactive
antibodies.
Conclusion: There remains a need for proficiency testing and advancement of quality control
practices to optimize human and animal rabies diagnostic and serological practices. Although
rabies excites the imagination, current vulnerabilities include the potential for re-introduction of
dog-to-dog transmitted rabies, a decline in diagnostic expertise and capacity, commercial
enterprises answering a perceived need for diagnosis and serology but with limitations in test
accuracy and specificity, and a lack of basic research, especially to understand recent advances
towards treatment of clinical rabies. As a global community with rapid and high volume exchange
of animate beings and inanimate products, diligent attention and dedicated effort will be required
to maintain, and indeed, even advance, emerging and zoonotic disease control, with rabies as a
tangible “best-practices” template, beyond major advances of the last half-century.