MesoScale and the Centers for Disease Control are working together to make flu season a little less scary.
Awarding a $706,241 grant to MesoScale Discovery, the CDC is hoping researchers can help develop a rapid diagnostic test for Avian Influenza.
“For people in the field, it would make a huge difference so they could make a decision very quickly rather than wait,” said Dr. Ruben Donis, the head of molecular virology at the CDC.
The CDC also awarded grants to three other research labs, with the total amount topping out at $11.4 million. With so many variations of Influenza, a disease carried in both humans and animals, it is important to easily and quickly recognize what mutation the virus has taken. This can often lead to dilemmas for patients and doctors, as the current test can take hours.
“You can?t hold a patient for so many hours before you can give them a suspicion and tell them what they can be [going through],” Donis said.
Some professionals view the current plan of attack against influenza to be just as impractical. Currently, the World Health Organization identifies three strains of flu in the spring that they consider to be the most likely to be carried in the fall. Those are taken to labs, where it takes months to create vaccines.
“[If we could] generate a flu vaccine without using all of those [strains],” said Larry Leitch, the Carroll County health commissioner, “if we could come up with some genetic or acellular way quickly or much quicker than [strains], that would be a number of steps forward.”
