CVI

The Central Veterinary Institute has specific expertise in the field of control of notifiable animal diseases related to Dutch and European legislation. CIDC's research field spans all notifiable diseases of farm animals (including fish, poultry and bees) in List A and B of the OIE. CIDC maintains its expertise by doing research primarily aimed at improving diagnosis and elucidating the pathogenesis and epidemiology of diseases. As the national reference institute CIDC is responsible for the diagnostics for export certification and supervises diagnostic standards for other Dutch veterinary laboratories. Highly infectious pathogens can be handled in the institutes High Containment Facility (BSL 3/4). CIDC is certified for ISO-17025 for specific diagnostic tests and ISO-9001 for other activities. Expertise: Diagnostics, improvement of diagnosis, molecular biology and epidemiology. Non-profit. National reference laboratory for all notifiable and exotic diseases.

Dr. W. Loeffen

Dr. Loeffen is a veterinarian. He has been working on CSF for two years and has 10 years of previous experience in field research at the Dutch Animal Health Service (Aujeszky's Disease, Swine Influenza). Currently he is project leader of the Classical Swine Fever group and head of the diagnostic lab for CSF. Some of the topics he is working on include surveillance, contingency planning, eradication strategies, developing new diagnostic tools and improving existing diagnostics.

Dr. P. van Rijn

Dr. van Rijn is a senior scientist with over ten years of experience on the molecular biology of Classical Swine Fever virus, including development of marker vaccines and accompanying tests. Currently he is involved in several projects for the development and automation of PCR tests, including CSF, ASF, FMD, AI and blue tongue.

Dr. A. Elbers

Dr. Elbers is a registered epidemiologist and has more than 10 years experience in epidemiological research on all kinds of diseases in a wide range of farm animals. He was part of a team of epidemiologists working for the government during the recent outbreaks of CSF, FMD and avian influenza in the Netherlands. One of the main subjects of his work over the past 6 years has been CSF and one of his current topics related to CSF is a project to develop clinical protocols for (official) veterinarians as a part of the whole surveillance for CSF.