Abstract | Rabies infection causes an acute viral encephalitis that is almost invariably fatal. Transmission most commonly occurs following the bite of an infected dog, and annually >55,000 people die from this disease, the majority being located in the developing world. Dog vaccination and responsible dog ownership are key to the control and elimination of rabies and the ability to detect virus neutralising antibodies is key to the evaluation of vaccination status following pre-immunisation. Current diagnostic tests are expensive, and as such are not readily performed in resource limited settings. To overcome this, lentiviral pseudotypes have been applied as an alternative platform for post vaccinal assessment and serosurveillance. The assay requires a small amount of serum in comparison to the standard fluorescent virus neutralisation assay (FAVN). Furthermore, the ability to tailor the assay according to facilities available through flexibility of reporter gene expression enables transfer of this technology across areas where the virus remains endemic, i.e. Africa and Asia. These reporter gene detection systems eliminate the need for expensive equipment and facilities allowing the assay to be performed in laboratories throughout the world. An inter laboratory ring trial has shown that the pseudotype assay for rabies virus is both reliable and reproducible. |
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