An ISU professor received the 2001 International Veterinary Congress Award from the American Veterinary Medical Association.

James Roth, distinguished professor of veterinary microbiology and preventative medicine, was selected from a pool of national candidates.

“Every year, only one person out of the entire country is chosen for the award,” said Phyllis Peters, communications specialist for the College of Veterinary Medicine.

“We feel very honored that someone from Iowa State was chosen.”

The award recognizes Roth’s success in his work on animal immunizations in developing countries in Africa and Latin America, she said.

“The only requirement for the award is to be a member of the American Veterinary Association, in which there are 60,000 members,” Roth said.

He has been at Iowa State since 1977, and he started the Institute for International Cooperation in Animal Biologics with the USDA in 1995, said Roth, who is executive director of the organization.

“The [Institute for International Cooperation in Animal Biologics], which involves animal health institutions located in Ames, consists of the ISU College of Veterinary Medicine and three USDA labs,” he said.

Jane Galyon, program coordinator for the Institute for International Cooperation in Animal Biologics, said the organization works with countries worldwide.

“We have trained 171 people from 61 different countries and 388 U.S. companies in the past six years,” Galyon said.

She said the countries work together to promote the usage of safe and effective vaccines for animals worldwide.

All the vaccines are regulated by the USDA, and the Ames group regulates vaccines for the entire United States.

“We also work on using vaccines and diagnostics to improve animal health in various regions of the world, in which we work a lot with developing countries in Central and South America,” Galyon said.

“We always have lots of requests for help from countries in Africa.”

Roth said the Institute for International Cooperation in Animal Biologics helps organize meetings in Latin America and Africa to harmonize regulations about animal vaccines to make it easier to import and export them.

“In many of those developing countries they don’t manufacture vaccines, so they have to import them,” Roth said.

He said regulations of the vaccines by other countries can be very different from those in the United States.

“We help harmonize regulations so they are similar in all countries,” Roth said. “It’s important to make vaccines readily available, because they are the most cost-effective ways to keep animals healthy. By keeping the animals healthy, it’s easier to keep the people in those countries healthy.”