How strains of viruses and bacteria are shipped and stored
In this country, viruses and bacteria strains are shipped and stored according to the relevant legislation (Russian Law “On sanitary and epidemiological well-being of the population”) and health and hygiene rules and standards.
All virological and biological laboratories have common procedures for working with viruses and bacteria. The regulations estimate the rules of conduct for employees, both inside laboratories and while transferring the materials outside the site. Also, in Russia import and export of bacteria and viruses strains outside the country is strictly regulated.
Beyond the national regulation, each laboratory has its own statutory rules according to which a designated person is responsible for storage, destruction, transferring or receiving viruses and bacteria for research purposes/
Special log is devoted to all the viruses and pathogens; this contains all the inventory and accountability performed by the site staff. All the strains are stored separately in individual specially marked tubes whose labels contain the following information:
- Name of the material
- Sampling date and time
- Passage No.
- Volume, and some other data
All the information on the tubes’ labels must correspond to the log’s entries. Entries are made on the labels which are further stuck to the tubes. For the sake of more security, information on the strains may be duplicated with another ink type or a graphite rod.
Storage conditions are dependent on the pathogen’s features. Most viruses are stored in refrigerated chambers in special sealed containers. Neutral or increased pH level is dramatic for the viruses’ vitality. When stored at 4 °С, many strains may survive within several weeks or even months; at that, infectivity is not affected.
Infectious materials transportation has its own peculiarities, depending on the strain type, however, some common rules are applicable:
- Infectious materials is tripleх-packaged, i.e., primary, secondary and hard outer shell. Secondary package also contains adsorbent against possible leakage
- Each package contains label with the information on the strain shipped.
- Hard outer shell contains contact data of the shipper and the receiver and also characteristic labels. In case temperature controlled regimen is required, cooling agent presence is obligatory to be indicated on the label.