LiquiTech and Spartan Bioscience Partner to Bring Innovative, Real-time Legionella Detection to Health Care Sector

OTTAWA, Ontario, July 11, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Spartan Bioscience, creator of the world's first on-site Legionella DNA test, today announced a partnership with LiquiTech, a leader in Legionella prevention for the health care, commercial, and hospitality industries.

Through this strategic partnership, LiquiTech will integrate Spartan's innovative environmental DNA testing platform to provide a new approach to detecting Legionella contamination. With Spartan's test, Liquitech can detect Legionella contamination in real-time and provide immediate remediation using their multi-barrier approach to dramatically improve patient and guest safety. This will provide unparalleled control of Legionnaires' disease in health care and hospitality environments.

"Our organization is always looking for innovative, proven solutions that allow for real-time detection of waterborne pathogen threats and Spartan's environmental testing platform is unmatched in the world," said Steve Schira, President and CEO of LiquiTech. "With Spartan's on-site test, LiquiTech can provide clients with a complete and integrated Legionella solution, from rapid on-site detection to immediate treatment and validation."

For the health care sector, rapid detection and remediation are critical because sick and elderly people are at the highest risk of contracting Legionnaires'. In 2017, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that 76 per cent of U.S. jurisdictions reported cases of Legionnaires' in health care facilities. Additionally, they found 1 in 4 people who become infected at a health care facility will die, compared to 1 in 10 people overall.(1)

For these reasons, the Centers for Medicare & Medicare services (CMS) require hospitals to maintain a Legionella management program including a testing protocol.(2) The problem is that the traditional Legionella detection method is lab culture testing in an off-site lab, which can take up to 14 days to provide a result. This turnaround time is too slow because Legionella can grow to outbreak levels in as few as 7 days.(3) Additionally, culture has been found to have a false negative rate of 62% because Legionella dies on the way to the lab.(4) In comparison, Spartan's test provides highly-accurate results in 45 minutes using a Nobel-Prize winning chemistry called quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (qPCR). qPCR is commonly used for medical diagnostics because it is faster and more accurate than culture.

"LiquiTech is a leader in water safety because of innovative technologies such as their Legionella copper-silver ionization solution," said Paul Lem, M.D., CEO of Spartan Bioscience. "We look forward to working with LiquiTech to prevent the risk of Legionella in water systems and to bring additional waterborne pathogen tests to the health care sector."

LiquiTech and Spartan are showcasing Spartan's on-site Legionella DNA test at the American Society for Health Care Engineering (ASHE) Conference from July 14-17 at the Baltimore Convention Center in Baltimore, MD.

About Spartan Bioscience
Spartan Bioscience is the leader in on-demand DNA testing.(5) The Spartan Cube, the world's smallest DNA testing platform, enables unprecedented portability and convenience in applications such as infectious disease, pharmacogenetics, and food and water safety testing. Spartan created the first on-site Legionella DNA test to prevent the risk of Legionnaires' disease outbreaks in buildings. It consists of the Spartan Cube and a single-use disposable test cartridge. Spartan's Legionella test is validated according to ISO 12869.(4) For more information, visit http://www.spartanbio.com/cube/legionella

About LiquiTech
Founded in 1992, LiquiTech is a pioneer in highly-effective technologies and services that secure water delivery systems against water pathogen risks. They provide multi-barrier protection; secondary disinfection; filtration; UV disinfection; water management plans; water analysis, testing and validation; and real-time, cloud-based monitoring and control systems overseen by specialized engineers. LiquiTech's copper-silver ionization disinfection technology is supported by more than 100 independent research studies and is state and federal EPA-registered for the eradication of Legionella in drinking water. Their clients include health care, hospitality, commercial, industrial and government facilities, with more than 1,800 installations around the world. For more information, visit http://www.LiquiTech.com

References
1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). (2017). Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 66(22): 584?589.
2. Centers for Medicare & Medicare services (CMS). (2017). Requirement to reduce Legionella risk in health care facility water systems to prevent cases and outbreaks of Legionnaires' disease. June 2.
3. Marshall AG, Bellucci EC. (1986). Hospitality Review. 1(4): Article 2.
4. Ahmed S et al. (2019). Journal of Water and Health. 17(2): 237?253.
5. Roberts JD et al. (2012). Lancet. 379:1705?11.

SOURCE Spartan Bioscience Inc.