Detection and typing of foot-and-mouth disease virus by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay: a sensitive, rapid and reliable technique for primary diagnosis.

A highly sensitive indirect sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay suitable for adoption as the routine diagnostic and typing test for foot-and-mouth disease virus of all seven serotypes is described. The assay uses rabbit and guinea pig antisera raised against inactivated 146S virus antigens. Strong homotypic and minimal heterotypic reactions with both whole virion 146S and derived virion subunit 12S antigens achieved a detection sensitivity approximately 125 times that of the complement fixation test. When applied to diagnostic material with positive-negative threshold criteria generated from testing a large number of negative samples, a positive result was obtained on 83.3 per cent of original virus-positive epithelia, three times the rate for the complement fixation test, and all were typed after one passage in culture.