IZSLER is a Public Technical-Scientific Body with and autonomous technical and administrative management. It offers services in the Public Veterinary sectors i.e. to the Regional and National Veterinary Services, Breeders and Consumers.  It provides services as required by national and regional laws in the fields of animal health and food security.

IZSLER has an extensive background in wild animal management, wildlife health and in the epidemiology of diseases shared between wildlife, livestock, and humans, including vector-borne diseases.

In Italy, as the in rest of Europe, the interest in the detection of wildlife infectious diseases has considerably grown in the last decades.

Thus, IZSLER has been progressively dedicated his activity also to: 

 

1) planning of harmonized monitoring program on zoonotic diseases;

2) adopting of shared diagnostic protocols to obtain comparable data;

3) designing an epidemiological picture of different diseases in the area of competence (North Italy);

4) sharing knowledge among stakeholders on wildlife disease. In the IZSLER are present the OIE Reference Laboratories for Swine Vesicular disease, for Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease, Rabbit Myxomatosis, and Swine Influenza, the FAO reference centre for foot and mouth disease and vesicular disease and 13 national reference laboratories. Among which there is the National Reference Centre for Viral diseases of lagomorphs;

 

They manage a biobank (www.ibvr.org) including several samples and material also from wildlife. This represents a rich source of samples for use in the APHAEA project and, at the same time, warrants the state-of-the-art diagnostic skills in direct and indirect diagnostic tests for wildlife diseases.

 

Contact: antonio.lavazza [at] izsler.it