The Allergic Reaction in Contagious Bovine Pleuropneumonia

Abstract

Serological diagnosis of Contagious Bovine Pleuropneumonia (CBPP) has been primarily by means of the complement fixation test (CFT), but also to a lesser extent by the slide agglutination serum test (SAST), the slide agglutination blood test (SABT) and the agar gel double diffusion precipitin test (AGT). All these tests, except possibly the slide agglutination tests, require some laboratory facilities and the case of the CFT quite elaborate ones. In addition, all these tests, except possibly the SABT, necessitate the numbering of each animal for subsequent identification. These factors form a serious obstacle to the diagnosis of CBPP in some countries of Africa due to the vast distances between the laboratory and outbreaks of the disease and the lack of communications and transport. The development, therefore, of a simple diagnostic test, along the lines of the tuberculin test, has had a high priority in research programmes on CBPP in East Africa.