Subject: Shipment of physical specimens
From: "ECDC Microbiology" <[email-masked]>
To: "Indra Alexander" <[email-masked]>, "Apfalter Petra" <[email-masked]>, "Wesley.Mattheus" <[email-masked]>, "steven.vangucht" <[email-masked]>, "ivanoov" <[email-masked]>, "stefka.krumova" <[email-masked]>, "ljiljana.zmak" <[email-masked]>, "selma.bosnjak" <[email-masked]>,Ivana Ferenčak <[email-masked]>, "m.mendris" <[email-masked]>, "Fani Theophanous" <[email-masked]>, "dpieridou" <[email-masked]>, "ckaragiannis" <[email-masked]>, "Zuzana Okonji" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "NC_CCB_Austria" <[email-masked]>, "sigrid.kiermayr" <[email-masked]>, "koen.blot" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, "Julien Sohier" <[email-masked]>, "Zhivka Getsova" <[email-masked]>, "Iva Christova" <[email-masked]>, "kcapak" <[email-masked]>, "bernard.kaic" <[email-masked]>, "Elisavet Constantinou" <[email-masked]>, "Czech Republic Generic Email Box -" <[email-masked]>,Hana Orlíková <[email-masked]>,Kamilla Grønborg Laut <[email-masked]>, "Stine Ulendorf Jacobsen" <[email-masked]>,Kärt Sõber <kart
Date: Fri, 14 Mar 2025 12:45:59 +0200

Tähelepanu! Tegemist on väljastpoolt asutust saabunud kirjaga. Tundmatu 
saatja korral palume linke ja faile mitte avada.

To: National Focal Points for Microbiology (members/alternates)

cc. National Coordinators (members/alternates)

Dear National Focal Points for Microbiology,

From our work with the EURLs and the disease networks, ECDC has received 
information on recent challenges related to shipment of physical specimens. 
This seems to primarily be related to clinical specimens, but we are of 
course also interested in learning if this also affects shipments of other 
materials, e.g. isolates, RNA or DNA samples,  cell lines and synthetic 
controls.

We would therefore appreciate your feedback on the questions below for us to 
fully understand the extent of the issues.

1.	Are you currently or can you foresee to be experiencing restrictions for 
shipping (a) clinical specimens, (b) isolates, (c) RNA or DNA samples,  (d) 
cell lines or (e) synthetic controls to other countries? If yes, please 
provide details in the replies to the questions below:
2.	What is the nature of these restrictions?
3.	Are the restrictions limited to shipments outside of the EU/EEA, or do 
they also affect shipments within the EU/EEA?
4.	What are the legal or policy basis for the restrictions, and who is 
enforcing them?
5.	What measures are you taking (or discussing / planning on taking) at the 
national level to address these restrictions?

Thank you in advance for providing your feedback on this no later than 
Friday 28 March 2025, and please do let us know should you have any related 
questions or queries.

Kind regards,

Daniel Palm

on behalf of the ECDC Microbiology Team

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)Gustav III:s boulevard 40, 169 73 Solna, Sweden

Phone +46 (0)8 58 60 10 00

 <https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/> www.ecdc.europa.eu

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