A new, rapid and cost-effective test for bovine tuberculosis being developed by Otago University could cut diagnosis times from 72 hours to about an hour.
The three-year project has just received $1 million in funding in the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s latest Endeavour Fund investment round.
Tb is caused by Mycobacterium bovis and is a highly infectious livestock disease that costs Aotearoa’s primary sector $160 million a year.
Otago University Rutherford Discovery Fellow at the Department of Microbiology and Immunology, School of Biomedical Sciences, Dr Htin Lin Aung, said the current testing regime for Tb requires a 72-hour turnaround, specialist equipment, skilled staff and laboratory infrastructure, which prevents diagnosis of the disease on farm and leaves infected animals in their herds while the results are pending.
He hopes the new test will reduce that time to one hour.
“This is a very lengthy process if you are the one doing the test or if you are the farmer waiting for the result,” Aung said.
It would also eliminate the need for skin tests, which can produce false-positive and false-negative tests, and the blood test, which confirms if the animal has Tb or not.
“I think it could be a game-changer because our test will be very quick, and it doesn’t have to be a vet or a skilled technician – farmers can do it as well.”
The test will also be non-invasive with no blood samples taken or injections, which the current testing system relies on.
Aung said they hope the test they develop will be similar to how people tested themselves for covid-19, which used a nasal swab, but based on a different technology.
Business development manager and patent attorney Tomas Ribeiro said that as well as providing farmers with a much faster diagnosis, it will be better for animal welfare.
“If you have a positive test in a large herd and you have to wait three to four days to get that result back, you have to cull the entire herd.”
A quick diagnostic test would allow the farmer to quickly separate those that test positive and those that are negative, and prevent the mass culling of herds, he said.
“There’s a massive economic benefit and there’s a massive animal welfare benefit.”
Aung said they will be working closely with stakeholders over the next three years as the test is developed and moves into the trialling stage.
It could also be used overseas to fight Tb and could serve as a platform technology for the detection of other pathogens in animals as well as humans.
“It has a lot of potential and we’re very excited by it.”
While it is a three-year project, the science behind it is well developed and the team is optimistic a prototype could be ready in 18 months.
