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The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL), in cooperation with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Division of Bacterial Diseases (DBD) is seeking to identify up to six state or local public health laboratories that will perform genome sequencing for Legionella pneumophila.

Eligibility

As part of the Advanced Molecular Detection & Response to Infectious Disease Outbreaks initiative, CDC is currently using genomic sequencing approaches to rapidly compare isolates from clinical specimens and potential environmental sources of Legionella spp. Part of this work involves developing and evaluating robust and reproducible methods, including wgMLST.

In order to build a comprehensive dataset for sequence comparison during legionellosis outbreak investigations, APHL is seeking proposals for laboratories to sequence collections of regionally associated clinical specimens accompanied with high quality epidemiological data.

Proposals will be evaluated based on the laboratory’s existing isolate repository, capabilities and facilities and applicants must have the following in place in order to be considered: 

  • Repository of archived L. pneumophila isolates (with associated metadata)
  • Established capability to perform culture of Legionella spp.
  • Established and demonstrated capability to perform NGS using Illumina MiSeq (previous Legionella NGS experience not a requirement)
  • Sufficient equipment, laboratory space and workforce capacity for the proposed workload
  • Local instance of Bionumerics (version 7.5 or 7.6)

Anticipated RFP Schedule

APHL anticipates the following schedule:

June 28, 2017 –            RFP Issued
July 10, 2017 –              Letter of Intent Due to APHL (see below)
August 11, 2017 –       RFP Responses Due
August 18, 2017 –        Proposal review completed
August 21-22, 2017 –  If needed, follow-up interviews and updated proposals due
August 23, 2017 –       Final review completed and awardees selected
August 31, 2017 –       Draft contracts submitted to APHL Legal Dept. for final internal review

Any modification to this anticipated schedule will be communicated on APHL’s procurement website (www.aphl.org/rfp) and via an email blast to the PHLs.

Request for Proposal Materials

The Legionella AMD RFP provides details on how to complete this RFP. The RFP contains a copy of the scoring criteria that will be used for evaluation of proposals in Appendix C. The details for expectations for Legionella AMD Partner Sites are contained in Appendix A. 

 

Q & A

Q1: How much associated metadata is required for the clinical isolates?

A1:  A description of the minimum requirements for accompanying epidemiologic data for clinical isolates is given on page 8 of the RFP in 5.c. of the Proposal – Required Submissions section. 

To summarize, it states: “At a minimum, please include whether isolates can be associated with specific outbreaks or clusters, type of clinical specimen (sputum, BAL, etc.), year of isolate, level of geographical specificity which can be provided for each isolate.”

In addition, Appendix C – Legionella AMD Site RFP Score Card lists the reviewer guidance for evaluating the robustness of the clinical isolate repository and availability of associated epidemiological data. Please review your application in light of the scorecard and provide the reviewers as much information as you are able to help them evaluate your collection as accurately as possible. 


Q2: My laboratory does not fully meet one of the minimum requirements. May I still apply?

A2: If sufficient applications are received that satisfy all of the minimum requirements, it is likely that your application will not be reviewed. You may submit a proposal that does not meet these requirements and it may or may not be considered at APHL’s discretion.