Animal vaccines linked to human health protection. (Technology).

When pathogenic bacteria contaminated the drinking water in Walkerton, Ontario, resulting in a number of deaths in that community, Canadians were alerted to the serious public health threat that can result from groundwater pollution. Although negligence was a substantial factor in the Walkerton tragedy, livestock manure was identified as the source of the contamination, increasing the public's concern about environmental and health impacts from livestock.

While a variety of measures must be put in place to prevent groundwater contamination, new research on animal vaccines taking place in Saskatchewan may someday make an important contribution to a solution. It may be possible to vaccinate livestock against some of the most significant bacterial pathogens so that the presence of these bacteria in manure will be largely eliminated.

Researchers are looking into the potential of animal vaccines to prevent the contamination of food as well as water. Scientists at Saskatoon's Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization (VIDO) believe vaccination could be a key component in controlling pathogens originating from food animals. They are currently studying new 'food and water safety' vaccines that may help producers and the entire market supply chain provide a safer product for consumers.

Although disease-causing organisms such as E. coli 0157, Salmonella, Campylobacter and Cryptosporidium may or may not harm the animals they colonize, they pose a danger to people even in trace amounts. These pathogens attach themselves to the gut and multiply inside the animal. A successful vaccine would prevent colonization of the animal by the pathogen; when the animal ingests the vaccine, the cycle of the pathogen's reproduction would be halted, so that less of the pathogen would be present at the slaughter level or in the manure.

VIDO reports that it has already made significant gains against one of the most important pathogens, E. coli 0157. An E. coli vaccine developed by scientists at the University of British Columbia and VIDO has been shown to reduce shedding of the bacteria by cattle. VIDO believes that if the vaccine proves as successful in field trials as it has in research-scale testing, the immunized animals should shelter fewer E. coli 0157 bacteria, reducing the risk of contamination.

The E. coli vaccine is an example of convergence in animal and human health research. In many respects, this vaccine is equivalent to a human health vaccine, since halting the transmission of the bacteria to the environment prevents human illness. Products designed to protect human health are given precedence by medical funding organizations over those designed strictly for animal protection, meaning a vaccine for animals that is ultimately designed for human health protection stands to attract more funding.

Saskatchewan has a unique opportunity to attract some of this money due to its strong animal research capacity, including VIDO and the Western College of Veterinary Medicine. One of the challenges always before the research community in Saskatchewan, however, is the ability to move research from the laboratory to the marketplace. One stage in this process involves scaling up production.

Researchers produce vaccines in very small quantities. The next stage is to increase production so that a larger amount of the vaccine, which is still true to the original product, is available for wider research, product development and field trials. Once production has been scaled up and the product is proven effective when re-tested on animals, it has considerably more commercial value. Saskatoon's Innovation Place has fermentation facilities that can be used to achieve this goal. These facilities are currently being upgraded to meet the increased demand for animal vaccine development and commercialization, both locally and worldwide.

The pre-commercialization stage is an essential step in bringing a product to the market since it adds value to the product, making the investment required to register and commercialize the product less risky. It attracts the participation of larger companies able to invest the money required to take products from our research institutions to a global market.

Malcolm Rollins is the Section Leader of Fermentation Technologies at the Saskatchewan Research Council.