Evaluation of cobas Influenza A/B & RSV test for diagnosis of equine influenza

Abstract A rapid and sensitive diagnostic method is needed to help prevent the spread of equine influenza virus. The cobas Influenza A/B & RSV test for the cobas Liat system (Roche Diagnostics) is based on real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and is designed to broadly detect influenza A virus RNA within 20 minutes. It detected a broad range of equine influenza virus strains, and detected equine influenza virus RNA from nasal swabs of infected horses at the same level as real-time RT-PCR, although it returned some invalid results (7.7%). This suggests that cobas Influenza A/B & RSV test is highly sensitive to equine influenza virus, but should be improved to reduce the rate of invalid results.