Development of a simple and rapid on-site veterinary fecal egg count test

Internal parasites of livestock result in a retardation of weight gain and sigificant economic losses. The main methods for the diagnosis of parasites are almost a centrury old, laboratory-based, time-consuming, laborious and notiriously unreliable. As a result, many animal owners have resorted to treating their animals prophylactically with deworming drugs instead of diagnosing the presence of parasites first. As a result, there has been a large rise the the number of drug-resistant parasites in the environment and the drugs used to treat them are rapidly becoming ineffective.The results of this project will lead to the development of a simple, on-site five-minute test using modern molecular technologies. The widespread availability of this economicl test will encourage veterinarians and animal owners to stop indiscrimate treatment of animals and restrict drug use to only when necessary following appropriate diagnosis. The will result in an increased efficiency of production (less parasite infection in the population) as well as meat containing fewer chemicals (decreased use of deworming drugs).