Bovine TB Vaccine Consultancy

Tender description

Bovine TB (bTB) is one of GB’s biggest endemic animal health issues, costing the taxpayer more than £100m a year. In the 12 months to March 2018 nearly 34,000 cattle were slaughtered for bTB control in England. Vaccination of either cattle or wildlife is an important long-term policy option for reducing the risk of bTB in England. As such, developing and licensing a cattle bTB vaccine and an oral badger bTB vaccine remains an important goal for the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (Defra). Defra bTB vaccine policy and advice teams are seeking to secure specialised and technical advice on the requirements for: • licensing of vaccines; and • the regulation and commercialisation of badger and cattle vaccine candidates and related in-vivo diagnostic tests. The Authority is seeking the services of a single contractor to provide expert advice for a critical period during which decisions will need to be taken on whether, and if so how, to proceed with research and development aimed at eventual licensing of an oral badger bTB vaccine and a vaccine for cattle with associated diagnostic test. The expertise could either be provided by one person, or by a team of experts working as a single contractor. This will be limited to advising bTB Policy and APHA Advisory teams, and is additional to any advice that is provided under any specific R&D contracts or as a member of one of Defra/APHA’s Vaccines Advisory Groups/Project Boards.