Genesis Bioventures Announces Improvements To Mad Cow Point-Of-Use Rapid Diagnostic Test
New York - Genesis Bioventures, Inc. (GBI) announced results of sample tests performed with the Prion Developmental Laboratories (PDL) mad cow diagnostic assay.
The PDL Rapid BSE test was evaluated in the second round of the European Union Food Safety Commission's validation series and was found to be 96% sensitive and 100% specific. Since that evaluation, recent improvements to the test increased the rapid assay sensitivity one hundred fold. Further sample tests done at the Central Veterinary Laboratory in Weybridge, United Kingdom, show that the test can detect earlier infections in cattle by achieving a 1:128 fold dilution compared to the previous 1:4 result.
"We are very pleased with the outstanding results of our proprietary mad cow disease assay on the severely deteriorated mad cow specimens we used to evaluate the new test. I expect our twenty minute rapid mad cow disease test will perform even better with fresh specimens, such as those our customers will test to ensure no mad cow disease infected meat gets into the human food supply," Robert B. Petersen, PhD, President of PDL commented.
PDL developed a rapid point-of-use assay to ensure human food safety by diagnosing bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, before the processed meat is made available for human consumption. Mad cow disease is an incurable disease that ultimately leads to death in animals and humans that become infected. It is believed that humans have contracted the disease by eating infected beef.
"We are very excited with continued development of this ground-breaking test by Dr. Petersen and Dr. Rubenstein, PDL's Chief Scientific Officer. Their scientific work is compelling because they have developed the world's only definitive assay that can be used to test each animal immediately before it is processed for human consumption," said Douglas C. Lane of Experigen. "This advantage will, for the first time, enable all cattle processors to test each animal without economic disadvantage and without changing their current meat processing methods."
"Testing each animal today is impractical with tests that take two or more hours to produce a result. Consequently, most animals are not being tested," said, Greg McCartney, CEO of Genesis Bioventures. "We believe PDL's BSE rapid assay advantage can improve the $98 billion dollar US livestock industry's economic outlook and possibly produce a positive effect on the current food embargoes of US beef exports by foreign governments."
SOURCE: Genesis Bioventures, Inc.