Persistence of antibody to 23-valent pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine: a 5-year prospective follow-up cohort study

ABSTRACT

Background

Pneumococcal vaccines are effective in preventing pneumococcal diseases in adults. The evaluation of the antibodies persistence to the 23-valent pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine (PPV23) could provide evidence on PPV23 revaccination.

Research design and methods

Adults aged ≥ 60 years were selected and vaccinated with PPV23 in Shanghai, and followed up for 5 years with blood samples collection of a 1-year interval. The geometric mean concentrations (GMC) of the IgG against 23 pneumococcal serotypes covered by PPV23 were detected using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The antibodies to 23 pneumococcal serotypes among different groups was analyzed using statistical analysis.

Results

Overall, 517 participants completed all six visits over a 5-year period (2013–2018). The GMC of 23 serotypes in adults aged ≥ 60 years decreased slowly after PPV23 vaccination compared to baseline pre-vaccination (P < 0.05), except serotype 3. Additionally, the multiplicative increase in the antibody concentration after PPV23 vaccination was greater, and the antibody levels of serotypes 1 and 6B were significantly higher at visit 5 than at visit 4 (P < 0.05).

Conclusions

The pneumococcal antibodies in elderly after PPV23 vaccination could sustain high levels over long-term follow-up, which suggested that the interval of revaccination with PPV23 in elderly should be at least 5 years after the first vaccination.

KEYWORDS:

• 23-valent pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine
• pneumococcal disease
• immunogenicity
• older adults
• antibody persistence

Declaration of interests

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

A reviewer on this manuscript is currently employed by Merck & Co working in pneumococcal vaccines. Other reviewers on this manuscript received honoraria for their review work. Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no other relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/14760584.2023.2296934.

Author contributions

XS and XG conceived and designed the study; JL, JQ, JR and FH carried out the data analysis. RZ, FL and QC conducted the laboratory work. XL contributed to the samples collection. FH and QL drafted the initial manuscript. ZH, ZL, XG, and XS contributed to data review and manuscript revision. All authors have read and provided final approval of the submitted version of the manuscript. All named authors meet the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) criteria for authorship for this article.

Data availability statement

The data generated and/or analyzed during this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This manuscript was funded by the National Technology Key Research Program of China under grant number 2016ZX09101091; XS was supported by the Talent training project for public health in China.