Crystal Garae and colleagues report on validation of the EasyScreen Flavivirus/Alphavirus Detection Kit and its application during the 2016–17 outbreak of dengue virus infection across the islands of Vanuatu.
The family Flaviviridae and Alphaviridae contain a diverse group of pathogens that cause significant morbidity and mortality worldwide.1 Identification of the virus responsible for disease is essential to ensure patients receive appropriate clinical management. Very few real-time PCR (RT-PCR)-based assays are able to detect the presence of all members of these families using a single primer and probe set.
Genetic Signatures has developed a novel chemistry, 3base,2,3 which modifies the viral nucleic acid sequences, allowing the design of RT-PCR assays capable of pan-flavivirus, pan-alphavirus and pan-dengue identification (Fig 1).
Materials and methods
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