Pneumococcal carriage in unvaccinated children at the time of vaccine implementation into the national immunization program in Poland
GIL Study Team
(2022) Scientific Reports, volume 12, issue 1
(Article)
Abstract
We investigated pneumococcal carriage among unvaccinated children under five years of age at a time when the conjugate polysaccharide vaccine (PCV) was introduced in Poland into the national immunization program (NIP). Paired nasopharyngeal swab (NPS) and saliva samples collected between 2016 and 2020 from n = 394 children were tested
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with conventional culture and using qPCR. The carriage rate detected by culture was 25.4% (97 of 394), by qPCR 39.1% (155 of 394), and 40.1% (158 of 394) overall. The risk of carriage was significantly elevated among day care center attendees, and during autumn/winter months. Among isolates cultured, the most common serotypes were: 23A, 6B, 15BC, 10A, 11A. The coverage of PCV10 and PCV13 was 23.2% (23 of 99) and 26.3% (26 of 99), respectively. Application of qPCR lead to detection of 168 serotype carriage events, with serogroups 15, 6, 9 and serotype 23A most commonly detected. Although the highest number of carriers was identified by testing NPS with qPCR, saliva significantly contributed to the overall number of detected carriers. Co-carriage of multiple serotypes was detected in 25.3% (40 of 158) of carriers. The results of this study represent a baseline for the future surveillance of effects of pneumococcal vaccines in NIP in Poland.
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Keywords: Carrier State/epidemiology, Child, Child, Preschool, Humans, Immunization Programs, Infant, Nasopharynx, Pneumococcal Infections/epidemiology, Pneumococcal Vaccines, Poland/epidemiology, Serogroup, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Vaccines, Conjugate, Journal Article, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
ISSN: 2045-2322
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
Note: Funding Information: M.W-R. has received speaking fees from Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline. A.G-K. has received speaker fees from Pfizer. T.J. has received grants and non-financial support from Pfizer, and personal fees (for being on an advisory board and speaker fees) from Pfizer, Merck Sharp & Dohme, and Sanofi Pasteur. A.M-M. has received fees for participation in advisory boards and speaking fees from Pfizer. A.S. has received grants and non-financial support from Pfizer, and personal fees (for being on an advisory board and speaker fees) from Pfizer, Merck Sharp & Dohme and Sanofi Pasteur. K.T. has received consultation fees, fees for participation in advisory boards, speaking fees and funds for unrestricted research grants from Pfizer, funds for an unrestricted research grant from GlaxoSmithKline, and fees for participating in advisory boards from Merck Sharp & Dohme, all paid directly to his home institution. L.S. has received personal fees (for being on an advisory board and speaker fees) from Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck Sharp & Dohme and Sanofi Pasteur. All other authors declare no competing interests. Funding Information: This work was supported by Pfizer via unrestricted grant (Investigator Initiated Research Project WI218378) to the National Medicines Institute and to A.S. (the principal investigator). We are grateful to the participating families for commitment to the study. We wish to thank Prof. Waleria Hryniewicz and Prof. Ron Dagan for their advice on the study design. Publisher Copyright: © 2022, The Author(s).
(Peer reviewed)
