Brussels, 28/02/2002 (Agence Europe) - a European research project involving the Centre de Recherche Mérieux-Pasteur in Lyons (France), the Institut Pasteur de Dakar (Senegal), the laboratories of the Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville (Gabon), the Marburg Institut für Virologie (Germany) and the Rotterdam Instituut voor Virologie (the Netherlands) have developed a new and improved diagnostic technique for viral diseases. The technique has already been successfully tested on yellow fever in Guinea and the Ivory Coast, Lassa fever in Guinea and Ebola fever in Gabon (a new Ebola fever epidemic broke out in Gabon in December 2001). The latter test confirmed the 2001 results for the other diseases in terms of the technique's validity. The project received funding of EUR 500 000 form a fund earmarked for international co-operation in the 5th Framework Research Programme.
The test uses the standard RT-PCR (reverse transcriptase - polymerase chain reaction) test that is used to detect viruses in blood, where a fragment of the virus' genome is amplified and then picked up in an electrical field. The improved technique uses a magnetic field and colloid magnetic chemistry with a specific primer for each virus. It must be amplified through a temperature cycle (a system of heating apparatus) and therefore the new technique can only be used in laboratories but it is all the same very easy to use, with fewer manipulations than other tests, which has the double advantage of cutting the risks of testing staff getting infected (there is a very high risk of contamination with blood disease viruses) and cuts the test time to around two hours. This time reduction may seem banal but it can be critical in the event of epidemics where huge numbers of tests have to be carried out, which is why the new technique was tested on virulent diseases like Ebola fever, which is highly contagious and is fond mainly in Africa and Asia. It leads to death in 70% of cases and is a haemorraghic fever about which little is known and for which no treatments or vaccines are available. The new technique applies to most viruses and may therefore be put into mass production for viral hepatitis.