Paediatric tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) vaccines: Schedules to optimise protection

Five year follow-up after primary vaccination against tick-borne encephalitis in children

“…While the findings from the present study are consistent with a number of previous reports that have demonstrated that Encepur ® Children elicits a stronger immune response compared to FSME-IMMUN ® Junior [9,16], it is important to note that other reports have shown the reverse [10,17]. Nevertheless, the common conclusion from all these studies is that despite being considered analogous vaccines, the immune responses to Encepur ® Children and FSME-IMMUN ® Junior are not identical.…”

Systematic literature review comparing rapid 3-dose administration of the GSK tick-borne encephalitis vaccine with other primary immunization schedules

“…Three weeks post-dose 3 delivered according to conventional (0-28-300 days) or modified conventional (0-42-300 days) dosing, all subjects (mean age 6.8 years) had NT titers ≥10 [39]. Similar results were seen in a multicenter study from Germany where 3 weeks after the last priming dose administered by conventional (0-28-300 days) or accelerated conventional (0-14-300 days), all children (mean age 4.8 years) had NT titers ≥10 [42].…”

“…Following two vaccine doses administered according to the conventional primary schedule (0-28 days), higher, more sustained antibodies were recorded than in children who had received two GSK TBEvac doses according to the accelerated conventional schedule (0-14 days) [42,44]. In a second study, 91% subjects (aged 1-11 years) had NT titers ≥10 five months after two primary vaccination doses of GSK TBEvac administered at 0 and 28 days [45,46].…”

Antibody persistence after two vaccinations with either FSME-IMMUN® Junior or ENCEPUR® Children followed by third vaccination with FSME-IMMUN® Junior

“…A clinical study has previously been conducted on the primary vaccination series with either FSME-IMMUN ® Junior or Encepur ® Children for the first and second vaccination, and Encepur ® Children administered as the third vaccination. 11,12 In that study, titers obtained by NT following the first and second vaccination with Encepur ® Children were higher than those obtained following administration with FSME-IMMUN ® 0.25 mL Junior. However, the results of the previously published part of the present study, 13 did not confirm the Wittermann findings demonstrating that higher immunological responses (NT and ELISA based) were induced after two vaccinations with FSME-IMMUN Junior ® than with Encepur ® Children.…”

“…11,12 Several explanations might be adduced to account for the higher immunological potential of FSME-IMMUN ® Junior based on the present study: there is more TBE virus antigen (1.2 µg) present in the FSME-IMMUN ® Junior vaccine formulation compared with that of the Encepur ® Children vaccine (0.75 µg); the possible presence of an aggregated fraction of human serum albumin and TBE antigen particles in the FSME-IMMUN ® Junior vaccine may enhance immune response; 11 although the antigenic components of both vaccines are highly homologous, the deduced amino acid variation identified at three positions of the E protein sequence of the Neudoerfl and K23 strains could potentially induce distinction in the antigenicity of the vaccine strains. 9,12,16 The ability of even single amino acid exchanges to induce variability in strain virulence has been shown in a mouse model. 16 However, the extent to which all these factors are involved in the post-vaccination immunological outcome has, to our knowledge, never been studied.…”