Animal instincts

The UK’s Institute for Animal Health takes a painful road but is confident of future stability

Veterinary medical research is often seen as the poor relation of the human medical sector. Blockbuster drugs and epidemics in humans are the object of much media attention, and pharma companies are, every so many years, accused of making excessive profits and of being run by directors with ‘fat cat’ salaries. Yet their importance is rarely questioned.

Veterinary research and medicines, on the other hand, seldom gain the attention that perhaps they should. But think back only a few years to the UK’s foot and mouth disease epidemic and the economic and emotional devastation wrought upon the farming and meat industries, and the importance of a strong and well funded veterinary community becomes more obvious.

In the UK, the Institute for Animal Health (IAH) is the largest research institute dedicated to the study of infectious diseases in farm animals. It has three sites, located at Compton, Berkshire, Pirbright, Surrey and Edinburgh. Its work may rarely make the mainstream press, but the IAH has made a number of breakthroughs that, had they occurred in the human field would have had us all tuning into the evening news. And that’s not all. The Institute also plays a vital role in disease control through acting as a world or EU reference laboratory for a number of economically important animal diseases.

The IAH was formed from a merger of four laboratories in 1986, the oldest of which was established in 1924. The information generated by the Institute is ultimately used by the industry of food producing animals, but is also used to inform policy decisions concerning animal health, genetics, and welfare. The changes that the institute is currently undergoing, however, have far broader implications.

A major centre for research, the IAH provides information for the development of vaccines, diagnostics kits and reagents, genes, gene products and vaccine vectors. It is a major force in education and training and provides reference laboratories for emergency diagnosis for a range of diseases on behalf of the Office International des Epizooties, the Food and Agriculture Organization and the EU. It also maintains a vaccine bank on behalf of an international consortium.

The IAH wins its funding from various sources. For example, for the year 2003/2004, income stood at £35.24 million. The Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) are major funders of IAH research, contributing £9.63 million and £9.08 million, respectively. Other government departments and Research Councils also make signification investments in the IAH’s work. Collaborative research projects with ‘industrial partners’, i.e. non-academia or government, contributed £867,000. The Institute also obtained £588,000 through the provision of a contract service to industry, for example, for vaccine testing using its animal models. On top of this, it also received significant income from rents and royalties.

Like any research laboratory, the IAH has found that it operates in an increasingly competitive world, and that nothing in life is guaranteed. Conscious of the need to modernise, the Institute has invested in its facilities to allow it to better compete. However, after almost three years of spending more money than it generates, late last year, the Institute had to announce a trimming back of research areas and redundancies in January this year. It now faces further uncertainties following the resignation of its director in April this year.

Science doesn’t stand still and neither can any research organisation that wants to keep winning contracts and funding. The IAH continues to evolve but these are difficult times for the Institute as with this evolution has come the need to streamline its research areas and lose staff in order to cut costs.

Last year was a time of significant capital investment for the Institute, implemented to ensure that it had modern facilities to support its science programme. In April 2004, it completed an extension to its animal facilities, enabling the expansion of its bovine TB research programme at Compton. Further disease secure accommodations was provided at Pirbright for work on foot and mouth disease and plans were put in place for additional new facilities. A new dairy and farm office complex at Compton became operational in September last year.

Work is due to start on the redevelopment of its Pirbright Laboratory later this year. The Institute says the project is needed to ensure that the UK can maintain its ability to respond promptly and effectively to incursions of exotic diseases, such as foot and mouth disease.

The total cost of this project will be in excess of £100 million, and includes additional laboratory space for co-locating the Virology Department from the Veterinary Laboratory Agency at Weybridge to the Pirbright Campus. Money has already been committed by the Office of Science and Technology, the BBSRC, and Defra.

More changes are also afoot. The IAH is planning for the relocation of its Edinburgh-based laboratory, the Neuropathogenesis Unit. The building where the unit is currently housed is nearing the end of its working life and the IAH is in the process of considering the best options for relocation. A decision should be announced by the middle of this year.

The Institute is faced with the dilemma that, in order to win research work it must have modern facilities and expertise to attract clients and contracts, with the money they bring. At the same time it needs to put its books in order, and to do this must reduce its costs.

In the second half of 2004 the seriousness of the Institute’s financial situation emerged and, on 11 November last year, the Institute revealed a recovery plan, designed to return it to a sustainable financial position. Drawn up in conjunction with its Governing Body and the BBSRC, the plan included a reduction in staff numbers. Although this would be partly achieved through redeployment, natural wastage and voluntary redundancies, the need for compulsory redundancies was also announced.

A total of some 70 posts would have to be lost as part of the recovery process, from Compton, Pirbright and the Neuropathogenesis Unit. Redundancies would be targeted to areas of lower scientific and strategic priority in order to preserve the Institute’s strengths. At the time of the announcement, the Institute had 521 posts.

Speaking at the time of the statement, BBSRC Chief Executive Julia Goodfellow said: “The Institute will experience a difficult period over the next 12 months, but I am sure [it] will be stronger at the end of it.” Acting Director Martin Shirley explained that the strategy had been developed to define key research priorities and that the Strategic Plan contained a framework for a sustainable research programme from which the Institute would continue to develop.

As part of the restructuring, there would be some ‘amalgamation’ of research activities, some redirection of the science programme and some unavoidable post losses. Estimates put the loss of scientists at around 25, although this figure would have been higher had the Institute not had a number of vacancies which could be filled through redeployment. Over the months ahead, it was later revealed, further post losses would be identified in the areas of support and administration, and these were expected to total around 40 positions.

The IAH has said that identifying areas from which to withdraw support has not been easy, but that it would maintain scientific strengths and expertise that would allow it to address its core aims. Among the research areas to be cut, some that address specific practical problems in the livestock sector, for example in dairy cattle mastitis, are expected to be taken forward through industrially-funded projects. In other areas, for example, avian poxviruses, where the research has led from livestock to potential human applications, research is being taken forward by other research groups in universities.

In particular the IAH is retaining expertise in infections and the attainment of immunity in the host; immunogenics; mechanisms of TSE transmission and involvement of prion protein in health and disease; avian virology; mammalian virology; bacteriology; coccidial parasites; epidemiological modelling and the Reference Laboratories of international and national importance.

At the beginning of April, however, the Institute was forced to make a further announcement - the resignation of its director, Professor Paul-Pierre Pastoret, following a period of illness. Professor Pastoret, an eminent veterinary scientist specialising in animal virus diseases at the University of Liege, joined the IAH in 2002. At the time of his appointment it was expected that the professor would enable the Institute to go from “strength to strength”.

Commenting on the resignation, Professor Goodfellow said: “ We have accepted Professor Pastoret’s request to step down as Institute director at this time and we are very grateful that Professor Shirley has agreed to continue his role as acting director. We are very sorry to lose Paul-Pierre but understand the reasons for his resignation as director.”

Following the resignation, Professor Pastoret has taken on the role of special scientific advisor to the BBSRC on animal health issues, starting on 1 May and continuing until the end of his contract in 2006. Professor Martin Shirley continues as acting director.

The IAH’s estimates of staff losses have proved to be accurate and the organisation is on course to meet its target. The driver behind the restructuring has been to make the Institute sustainable in the long term and there is currently no expectation that there will be any further redundancies once the recovery plan has been implemented in full.

Acting IAH Director Professor Martin Shirley commented: “With a staff number of 450 full time employees, by the end of 2005, and a small cut to budgets, the finance of the finances of the IAH are under control through this financial year and the IAH will once again be in the black.”

The IAH’s restructure should be complete by the end of this year. Professor Shirley continued: “From an organisational viewpoint, the restructuring is going according to plan. However, it is painful for the staff caught up in the process that is in place to ensure the IAH returns to financial stability.”

By Mark Clements