Hope johnson of international vaccine ...

Serotypes currently included in existing pneumococcal due to drugs for 49-88% of all deaths under 5 years in Africa and Asia, where morbidity and mortality from pneumococcal infection is greatest and where until recently most children do not have access to the current pneumococcal vaccine combined. These are the main conclusions of scientific research

this week from Hope Johnson of the International Centre for access to vaccines, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, USA, and colleagues. After extensive literature review, which includes information on 60,090 isolates

from 70 countries, according to the authors, causing serotypes of invasive pneumococcal disease among children under five years in different regions of the world. They found that found seven serotypes (1, 5, 6a, 6b, 14, 19F and 23F) are the most common worldwide and that these seven serotypes of invasive pneumococcal constitute the majority of infections in each region. These important results indicate that producers of policy in public health to evaluate the potential impact of serotypes included in different vaccines conjugated vaccines and manufacturers can now work with a consensus set serotypes coverage estimates to plan and design future serotype-based formulation of the target local pneumococcal disease more sure. The authors say: "Our results contradict the usual assumption that the most common serotypes causing [invasive pneumococcal infections] vary greatly in different geographic regions."

They add: "Recent progress in strattera 25mg widening access to the conjugated pneumococcal vaccine in high-burden countries will contribute to achieving by 2015 the Millennium Development Goals 4 goal to reduce child mortality by two thirds"

Additional information: . Johnson HL, Delors-Knoll M, Levine AS, Stoszek SK, Freymanis Hans L, et al. (2010) systematic evaluation of serotypes causing invasive pneumococcal disease among children under five years: Pneumococcal serotype Global project. PLoS Med 7 (10): e1000348. Provided the Public Library of Science (.