Page 34 - VHSA - Onderstepoort 100 Years - Part 1

OND
ERSTEPOORT 100
Onderstepoort professional staff in 1958 when the Institute celebrated its 50th jubilee
bluetongue in the USA in 1953.
By 1956, when an outbreak of bluetongue occurred in
Portugal and Spain, Haig had perfected bluetongue virus cultivation in cell cultures. This led to the development of diagnostic neutralization tests and to vaccine production using the new technology. Onderstepoort was thus in a unique position to assist the Mediterranean countries in identifying and typing the virus responsible
which progress was made. In 1952 Natal was declared free from nagana, following the successful tsetse fly eradica- tion campaign mentioned above. Corridor disease was first detected in South Africa in 1953 by Neitz and co-workers who, in 1955, named it after the corridor between the then Hluhluwe and Umfolozi game reserves. They experimentally transmitted the disease by ticks from African buffaloes to
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for the outbreak in their countries and in training their scientists in the production of vaccine to combat it. These activities led to the appointment of Onderstepoort as World Reference Centre for bluetongue and African horsesickness by the Office International des Epizooties (OIE) in 1956, a status it has maintained until today.
cattle and identified the causal organism as a new Theileria species. It took another half century before molecular genetic studies proved that it is only one of several variants of the Theileria parva organism which causes East Coast fever. Another cattle disease, dubbed ‘sweetsiekte’ or ‘sweating disease’ by farmers, was shown in 1953 to be transmitted by Hyalomma truncatum ticks by Neitz, who determined in subsequent studies that the ticks produce a toxin that is responsible for the disease.
The ‘new’ faculty buildings to the west of the Soutpan road were completed by the end of 1954 at a cost of half a million rand to accommodate the expected post-war boom in the number of students. In 1955
Other virological breakthroughs inclu-
ded the isolation of Wesselsbron virus in 1954
by K.E. Weiss, Haig and Alexander, followed
by its attenuation in mouse brains and use
in a combined vaccine with RVF virus; the
isolation and characterization of the lumpy
skin disease virus (LSDV) by Alexander,
Plowright and Haig in 1957; the identifica-
tion of seven African horsesickness virus (AHSV) serotypes by means of neutralization tests by B.M. MacIntosh in 1958 and similarly of 12 bluetongue virus (BTV) serotypes by P.G. Howell in 1960. In 1961 Weiss succeeded in developing a lumpy skin disease vaccine by successive passage of the virus in lamb kidney cells and embryonated eggs (see also Part 3: Virology). However, Virology was not the only discipline in
the new campus was officially opened by the Prime Minister, J.G. Strydom, and student numbers first doubled to 30 per annum and later increased to 45. In order to accommodate the increased teaching responsibilities and maintain the close integration of the Institute and the Faculty as far as possible, five of the latter’s departments became full-time in terms of the teaching responsibilities of its staff in 1958, although still
“Onderstepoort was appointed as World Reference Centre for bluetongue and African horsesickness by the Office International des Epizooties (OIE) in 1956, a status it has maintained until today.”
PART 1
Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute: General History
1908-2008
Years