New Cryptosporidium Testing Methods

摘要

When EPA published in 1994 its intention to collect information on the prevalence of the protozoans Giardia and Cryptosporidium in drinking water by monitoring public water supplies, water microbiologists were unhappy with the proposed analytical method for Cryptosporidium. The collection procedure and immunofluorescence as-say required in EPA's information collection rule (ICR) had many deficiencies. "It's very experience-intensive, it's time-consuming, it's expensive, it doesn't give you information on viability and infectivity of organisms, and it doesn't tell you the species you're detecting," asserted microbiologist Walter Jakubowski of EPA's National Exposure Research Laboratory in Cincinnati. And in dealing with a waterborne pathogen like Cryptosporidium parvum, an analytical test that does not tell whether the organism is present could be a serious public health threat: in its worst outbreak in Milwaukee in 1993, the microbe infected 403,000 people and contributed to 100 deaths.