October 20, 2006

Canada to fund for antibiotic research

Canada would fund about US$1.75 million for University of Saskatchewan's vaccine and infectious disease organization.

In a bid to develop alternatives to antibiotics for University of Saskatchewan's Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organisation (VIDO), the Canadian government would dole out US$1.75 million over the next three years.

The federal funding under the Advancing Canadian Agriculture and Agri-Food (ACAAF) Programme would allow the VIDO to undertake a three-year research project focusing on poultry and swine, but could eventually include cattle entering feedlots to prevent bacterial infection and increase the protective power of vaccines.

Research that better protects livestock from infectious diseases and leads to safer food makes sense both for producers and consumers, said Chuck Strahl, minister of agriculture and agri-food as also minister for the Canadian Wheat Board.

The funding was part of a study undertaken by Canada's new government to find substitutes to reduce or replace antibiotics in livestock and poultry operations. Under the project, the VIDO would test the use of naturally occurring peptides to provide early protection for animals by stimulating innate immunity and directly killing bacteria, as well as increasing the magnitude of the immune response following vaccination.

Even as the country's livestock continued to fall prey to infectious diseases, thereby resulting in major economic losses, no new classes of antibiotics had been developed in the last 20 years.

Infectious agents were not restricted to any region, said Dr Lorne Babiuk, VIDO director. Developing substitutes for antibiotics is even more important now as antibiotic disease resistance increases on a global scale."