APHL seeks to select up to 12 public health laboratories or their jurisdictionally-affiliated TB control programs for the purpose of expanding the use of Interferon Gamma Release Assays (IGRA) to aid in diagnosis of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection.
Requirements
All state or local US public health laboratories or TB Control programs are eligible to apply provided their proposal is written in collaboration with their jurisdictional counterpart. A letter must be submitted with all applications from both the laboratory and their jurisdictional control program that demonstrates a joint plan. Potential scenarios include:
Option 1: Public health laboratory in a given jurisdiction currently has some limited capacity to perform IGRA but with programmatic input would like to expand testing capability.
Option 2: Public health laboratory that does not currently perform IGRA but would like to implement IGRA as an in-house service based on a defined programmatic need.
Option 3: TB Control program in a jurisdiction where the public health laboratory is either not interested or not able to expand testing capability or to bring IGRA in-house.
Proposals will be evaluated based on the proposed plan including:
- Demonstration of programmatic/laboratory collaboration
- Implementation/Expansion plan
- Evaluation plan
Timeline
October 30, 2015 – RFP issued
November 10, 2015 – Informational teleconference for RFP questions and answers
December 11, 2015 – RFP responses due
December 18, 2015 – Proposal review completed
December 18-30, 2015 – If needed, follow-up interviews and updated proposals due
December 30, 2015 – Final review completed and reference center selection
January 30, 2016 – Contracts finalized and work begins
Request for Proposal Materials
The Expanded access to Interferon Gamma Release Assays (IGRA) 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.