Development Of A Rapid Diagnostic Test To Identify Crimean-Congo Haemorrhagic Fever At The Point-Of-Care

The Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) in collaboration with Global Access Diagnostics (GADx) have achieved the development of the first RDT to detect CCHF viral antigens with a sensitivity and specificity that exceeds the minimum recommendation in the WHO target product profile (TPP)of \>80% and \>90% for sensitivity and specificity respectively for minimal performance in pre-clinical studies. The RDT is not only faster providing a test result within 20 minutes, but is also substantially cheaper than RT-PCR, and simpler to perform. A predicted price per test of around $5, whereas the current price of the RT-PCR test ranges from $1,000 to $1,200 for 96 reactions. The RDT does not require refrigeration or require specialist personnel to undertake, and the only additional apparatus needed is a stopwatch to monitor running time.