Chinese company contracts MSI to develop world's first rapid avian flu test
Chinese corporation to produce a potentially life-saving diagnostic
test kit for avian flu that will give test results in 30 minutes
instead of the current three days.
>MSI, headquartered in Canada, will be the only company with a rapid diagnostic test kit for avian flu. The company said that the key to manufacturing the kit for avian flu is having access to the necessary antigens, and according to MSI, the undisclosed Chinese company has the only registered antigen for avian flu available worldwide.
MSI has been contracted to produce two test kits: one for humans and one for birds and other animals, using its existing VScan avian flu kit technology.
The VScan rapid test kit is a disposable and cost effective test currently used for the screening of HIV 1&2, hepatitis B&C, tuberculosis, dengue fever, West Nile, syphilis, malaria, and prostate cancer.
MSI said it is able to modify its existing West Nile technology into a new kit to detect the avian flu virus and anticipates the new kits to be available within 60 to 90 days.
This rapid screening kit, which will test whole blood, is expected to attract significant demand, as the key to controlling the avian flu is early detection, isolation and treatment.
Currently there are avian flu infections in only birds in Europe while in Asia the avian virus is found in both humans and birds. In Asia, the avian flu has infected humans in eight countries, killing over 65 people so far.
The virus does not pass from person to person easily, but experts fear the virus could mutate into a form that could be passed on among humans and cause a pandemic.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the next flu pandemic is likely to result in 1 to 2.3 million hospitalisations and 280,000 to 650,000 deaths in industrialised nations alone.
