Obiettivo
Sylvatic rabies has been partly eliminated from large parts of several Member States by oral immunisation of foxes, but a dramatic increase in fox population densities renders a complete eradication of the disease more difficult. More likely an irrepressible come back of the disease will be seen in the future in areas freed from the disease just a few years ago. This threat comes from remnant focii centralized in rabies-free areas and from non member-states where rabies remains present or on the increase. Selvatic rabies is an economic problem. It has a welfare impact, and constitutes a hindrance to free movement within the E.U.
The main organisations in charge of the control of rabies in 5 European countries and one laboratory of animal ecology are proposing the development of testing appropriate countermeasurements instead of the currently used and often non efficient classical oral vaccination of foxes. Information on the possible negative impact of rabies elimination must also be obtained which includes a significant increase of fox population. While several European teams are now organising heavy field trials aimed at vaccinating fox cubs, nothing is known about the immunological competency of fox cubs. Other new measures in practice consist in increasing the density of baits deposited or vaccinating the same areas two times within a short delay. These measures multiply the cost of rabies control.
This (suggested) project includes three trials on fox cubs including vaccination of pregnant vixen, and testing on fox cubs subsequently vaccinated or not. Also one must determine the stability of vaccines in use. In fact huge amounts of vaccines are made of viruses very temperature-sensitive.
In most European countries, no titre control is done after vaccine distribution. Well standardized protocols will be organised in every Partner country, which will probably give clues to the origin of some failures currently seen.
Also of importance is to define the optimal density of baits that need to be deposited in correlation with fox density. We will organise a specific field protocol in two Member States in areas inhabited by various fox population densities and three different densities of baits will be distributed. However the perequisite for this protocol is to define a common method for indexing fox density. In order to do this we will
(i) set Up one or two abundance indexes of fox density that will be easy to record by veterinary services, and
(ii) calibrate these indexes with more elaborate methods in order to correlate them with real (fox) density.
Double short delayed oral vaccination protocols will be tested on caged adult foxes for verifying that they provide a booster response significantly more protective than one single vaccination and the most appropriate delay between the first and the second distribution of baits will be determined.
It is impossible to compare national or regional vaccination programs because: (1) areas are not characterised with the same index or with correlated indexes of fox density, (ii) and even if the sampling of fox sera is consistent in areas, the ELISA methods in use in the Member States give very divergent results. We want to identify the main factors that influence efficacy of vaccination programmes, therefore, in order to compare the increase in the ratio of immunized foxes between areas vaccinated after campaigns, we will standardise and calibrate an ELISA test for fox serum samples taken in the fields. Using this standardised ELISA test, sera will be re-tested to allow a retrospective analysis in regard with the density and type of vaccine bait used, dates of campaigns, and methods of deposit.
Using this newly calibrated index of fox density and ELISA methods, an evaluation of the ongoing vaccination campaign will then be carried out. Relation between fox density, control methods and rabies advance or elimination will be investigated using mathematical models.
The results will allow the development of a computer programme package ready to use by veterinary units. A common tool for the molecular characterization of rabies strains is not currently employed in the surveillance and control of rabies in the E.U. An objective of this proposal will be to do this in one laboratory, in order to identify both the geographical and the species origin of isolates from remnant or unexpected focii. The main possible negative impact of the increase of fox density is a greater risk of the transmission of Alveolar echinococcosis to Humans. Methods for determining the frequency in fox feces of the causative agent of this disease (Echinococcus mulltilocularis) will be developed. This project will be carried out over a three year period. All results will be delivered to involved veterinary units, then published in scientific international journals. The benefit expected from this proposal will be to optimise the use of current funds already allocated by the E.U. for oral vaccination of foxes, no commercialisation will be considered from obtained results.
Campo scientifico (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifica i progetti con EuroSciVoc, una tassonomia multilingue dei campi scientifici, attraverso un processo semi-automatico basato su tecniche NLP. Cfr.: Il Vocabolario Scientifico Europeo.
CORDIS classifica i progetti con EuroSciVoc, una tassonomia multilingue dei campi scientifici, attraverso un processo semi-automatico basato su tecniche NLP. Cfr.: Il Vocabolario Scientifico Europeo.
- scienze mediche e della salute medicina di base immunologia immunizzazione
- scienze naturali scienze biologiche microbiologia virologia
- scienze naturali scienze biologiche ecologia
- scienze mediche e della salute medicina di base farmacologia e farmacia farmaci vaccini
- scienze naturali matematica matematica applicata modello matematico
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Gli inviti a presentare proposte sono suddivisi per argomenti. Un argomento definisce un’area o un tema specifico per il quale i candidati possono presentare proposte. La descrizione di un argomento comprende il suo ambito specifico e l’impatto previsto del progetto finanziato.
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Meccanismo di finanziamento (o «Tipo di azione») all’interno di un programma con caratteristiche comuni. Specifica: l’ambito di ciò che viene finanziato; il tasso di rimborso; i criteri di valutazione specifici per qualificarsi per il finanziamento; l’uso di forme semplificate di costi come gli importi forfettari.
Coordinatore
54220 MALZEVILLE
Francia
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