NEW YORK, Sep 28 (Reuters Health) -- For the first time, a vaccine has proven highly effective in preventing cases of childhood pneumonia, an illness that claims the lives of millions of children each year.
"We've made great progress and that's encouraging," said study co-director Dr. Henry Shinefield, of the Kaiser Permanente Vaccine Study Center in Oakland, California. He and co-director Dr. Steven Black presented their findings at the 39th Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, held in San Francisco.
The pneumococcal family of bacteria are the leading cause of the majority of pneumonia cases, which kill over 1.2 million people each year, including thousands of children living in the developing world. However, until now, researchers have been frustrated in their search for pneumonia vaccines effective in children.
According to a conference report, the vaccine "was formulated to protect against the seven strains of pneumococcus bacteria (prevalent) in the US." Black and Shinefield's team tested the vaccine on 38,000 California children. Half the children received the new vaccine, while the other half did not.
According to the authors, vaccination resulted in:
-- a 73% decline in the incidence of severe pneumonia (as confirmed by chest x-ray);
-- a 33% reduction in pneumonia cases;
-- and an 11% decline in physician visits linked to pneumonia infection.
The researchers report that, overall, "the investigational vaccine was 97% effective in preventing invasive (pneumococcal) disease." Furthermore, vaccination reduced the incidence of pneumococcus-related ear infection (otitis media), as well.
"We have extensively evaluated the vaccine's safety and efficacy in a large population over a long period of time," Shinefield said in a Kaiser statement. "I think parents and physicians will welcome this vaccine because it will be effective in fighting a threat to the health of young children."
