Within the activitites of FAO Reference Centre for Rabies, the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie (IZSVe) has been involved for years in the capacity building for the diagnosis of rabies of veterinary laboratories in Sub-Saharian African Countries.

Among these activities, between 2017 and 2018 the IZSVe organised a Proficiency Test (PT) to which 13 Central Veterinary Laboratory and 1 public health Institute based in Sub-Saharan Africa participated. This international collaboration permitted the implementation of diagnostic protocols, the collection of laboratory workload data and favorised the harmonisation of diagnostic techniques. The results of the PT have been recently published on the PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases journal.

Herebelow you can watch a webinar organised by the International Society for Neglected Tropical Diseases (ISNTD) and held by the IZSVe and OIE expert Morgane Gourlaouen about the experience of the inter-laboratory trial which involved Sub-Saharian African laboratories. The webinar was recorded online by the ISNTD on 21 April 2020 as part of ISNTD Connect, a series of online short meetings in infectious diseases, tropical diseases and public health.