ANNEX III U.K.COMMUNITY REFERENCE LABORATORIES FOR THE DISEASES CONCERNED

The functions and duties of the Community reference laboratories for the diseases concerned shall be:

1.

to coordinate, in consultation with the Commission, the methods employed in the Member States for diagnosing the disease concerned, specifically by:

(a)

typing, storing and supplying strains of the virus of the relevant disease for serological tests and the preparation of antisera;

(b)

supplying standard sera and other reference reagents to the national reference laboratories in order to standardize the tests and reagents used in the Member States;

(c)

building up and retaining a collection of virus strains and isolates of the relevant disease;

(d)

organizing periodic comparative tests of diagnostic procedures at Community level;

(e)

collecting and collating data and information on the methods of diagnosis used and the results of tests carried out in the Community;

(f)

characterizing isolates of the virus of the relevant disease by the most up-to-date methods to allow greater understanding of the epizootiology of the disease;

(g)

keeping abreast of developments in the surveillance, epizootiology and prevention of the relevant disease throughout the world;

(h)

retaining expertise on the relevant disease virus and other pertinent viruses to enable rapid differential diagnosis;

(i)

acquiring a thorough knowledge of the preparation and use of the products of veterinary immunology used to eradicate and control the relevant disease;

2.

to assist actively in the diagnosis of outbreaks of the relevant disease in Member States by receiving virus isolates for confirmatory diagnosis, characterization and epizootiological studies;

3.

to facilitate the training or retraining of experts in laboratory diagnosis with a view to the harmonization of diagnostic techniques throughout the Community.