Evaluating clinical effectiveness and safety of pneumococcal immunization of infants

Abstract

According to WHO, pneumococcal infection (PI) is considered one of the most dangerous of all vaccine-preventable diseases and, before vaccination, led to the death of up to 1.6 million people per year, of which from 0.7 to 1 million were children. In the prevention of PI, specific prevention occupies a special place. For the first time in 2014, vaccination against PI with pneumococcal conjugate vaccine was included in the national calendar of preventive vaccinations. International practice of using pneumococcal vaccine has shown that timely vaccination can produce positive results in the fight against PI. Under observation were 55 children who were vaccinated against PI with the pneumococcal polysaccharide conjugate vaccine (adsorbed), 13 valent according to the national calendar of preventive vaccinations of the Russian Federation. It was revealed that post-vaccination complications after vaccination did not occur in any child. General post-vaccination reactions were observed in the form of a short-term increase in temperature, loss of appetite and sleep disturbances, as well as local reactions in the form of edema, hyperemia, and hardening at the site of vaccine administration. We studied the incidence of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), acute otitis media and acute respiratory infections among 55 children of the first year of life vaccinated at 2 months and 4.5 months (main group) and 50 children for various reasons not vaccinated against PI (comparison group). A study of the long-term results of 2-fold vaccination in the first year of life and revaccination at 15 months against PV based on observation of children for two years showed that children of the main group, compared with the comparison group, were 3.3 times less likely to suffer from PV, 2.7 times acute otitis and 1.7 times acute respiratory infections, p < 0.05. The data obtained show the high efficiency and safety of vaccinating children against PI with the pneumococcal vaccine.