Global maternal Strep B vaccination program could save millions and prevent thousands of deaths worldwide
2023-03-14
(Press-News.org) A global maternal immunization program for group B Streptococcus - strep B - would save millions in healthcare costs by reducing death and disability, but without tiered pricing, equitable access would likely not be achieved. Several vaccines are currently under development, and an assessment of the impact and value of a global program is publishing March 14th in the open access journal PLOS Medicine. It finds that this could avert over 200,000 cases and more than 31,000 deaths, and reduce disability in children.
Strep B can infect pregnant women and their babies, causing sepsis and meningitis in newborns, and sometimes leading to death or disability. It is linked to increased risks of stillbirth and preterm births. As vaccines get closer to approval, a global economic evaluation of vaccination will inform investment decisions in further vaccine development as well as guide fair financing and pricing.
Simon Procter of London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, United Kingdom, and colleagues developed a model to assess the cost-effectiveness of Strep B vaccines in 140 million pregnant women in 183 countries in 2020. They used recent global estimates of the health burden of strep B in pregnant women and their children and estimated costs to healthcare systems, calculating quality-adjusted life years lost due to infant mortality and long-term disability.
Based on the World Health Organization’s published list of preferred features for a Strep B vaccine, the team assumed that the vaccine would prevent infection in 80% of women vaccinated, and that women receiving at least four antenatal visits would get vaccinated. They assumed a cost of $50 a dose in high income countries, $15 in upper-middle income and $3.50 in low- and lower-middle income countries. Vaccination could avert 127,000 early-onset and 87,300 late-onset infant iGBS cases, 31,100 deaths, 17,900 cases of moderate and severe neurodevelopmental impairment, and 23,000 stillbirths.
The study is limited by a lack of some data, such as on the impact of Step B on health-related quality of life and long-term costs of disability, but it estimates that a 1-dose vaccine program could cost $1.7 billion globally, while saving $385 million in healthcare costs. The team caution that regional sensitivities to vaccine prices could affect policy decisions and that tiered vaccine pricing would enable equitable access.
Dr. Procter adds, “By reducing severe GBS infections, an effective maternal GBS vaccine deployed worldwide could prevent tens of thousands of newborn deaths and stillbirths each year. Our findings suggest maternal vaccination against GBS could be cost-effective in most countries, and we hope this will encourage the further investment needed to bring GBS vaccines to market.”
#####
In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Medicine: http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1004068
Citation: Procter SR, Gonçalves BP, Paul P, Chandna J, Seedat F, Koukounari A, et al. (2023) Maternal immunisation against Group B Streptococcus: A global analysis of health impact and cost-effectiveness. PLoS Med 20(3): e1004068. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1004068
Author Countries: United Kingdom, Switzerland, China
Funding: SRP, BPG, PP, JC, FS, AK, JEL and MJ were supported by funding from a grant (INV-009018) to the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (PI JEL) from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
END
[Attachments] See images for this press release:
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2023-03-14
X-ray detection is widely used in medical imaging, radioactivity detection, security checking, industrial flaw inspection, and so on. In recent years, metal halide perovskites have demonstrated excellent performances in the detection of X-rays and gamma-rays. However, most studies focus on perovskite single-pixel devices. To achieve the application goal of X-ray imagers, the detectors should be integrated with pixel circuits. This means that the device dark current is an important figure of merit to be considered. The low dark current can guarantee ...
2023-03-14
WASHINGTON, March 14, 2023 – The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increases daily with no sign of stopping or slowing. Too much of civilization depends on the burning of fossil fuels, and even if we can develop a replacement energy source, much of the damage has already been done. Without removal, the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere will continue to wreak havoc for centuries.
Atmospheric carbon capture is a potential remedy to this problem. It would pull carbon dioxide out of the air and store it permanently to reverse the effects of climate change. Practical carbon capture technologies are still in the early stages of development, with the most promising involving ...
2023-03-14
WASHINGTON, March 14, 2023 – In a world experiencing growing inequality and intolerance, tools borrowed from science and mathematics could be the key to understanding and preventing prejudice.
In Chaos, by AIP Publishing, Luis A. Martinez-Vaquero of the Polytechnic University of Madrid applied evolutionary game theory, which combines techniques from economics and biology, and complex system analysis to investigate the relationship between inequality and intolerance. He found that inequality boosts intolerance and that redistribution ...
2023-03-14
About The Study: Implementation in California of its Insurance Gender Nondiscrimination Act was associated with a significant increase in utilization of gender-affirming surgery in California compared with the control states Washington and Arizona. These data might inform state legislative efforts to craft policies preventing discrimination in health coverage for state residents, including transgender and gender-diverse patients.
Authors: Anna Schoenbrunner, M.D., of Ohio State University in Columbus, is ...
2023-03-14
About The Study: In this study of 318 mothers in Australia, the U.K., and the U.S., antenatal COVID-19–related stress was significantly associated with poor postpartum maternal mental health outcomes and increased negative affectivity among infants. Pregnant individuals should be classified as a vulnerable group during pandemics and should be considered a public health priority, not only in terms of physical health but also mental health.
Authors: Susanne Schweizer, Ph.D., of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, United Kingdom, is the corresponding author.
To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link ...
2023-03-14
About The Study: The results of this study showed that intimate partner violence experiences at the start of the pandemic were associated with worse mental health symptoms and modifiable health factors for female participants younger than age 60. Screening and interventions for intimate partner violence and related health factors are needed to prevent severe, long-term health consequences.
Authors: Arielle A. J. Scoglio, Ph.D., of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston, ...
2023-03-14
PASADENA, Calif. — A Kaiser Permanente study of more than 800,000 young people between the ages of 3 and 17 showed that youth at the upper range of average weight had a 26% higher risk of developing hypertension than those closer to what is considered average weight. The study was published March 14, 2023, in JAMA Network Open.
“Hypertension during youth tracks into adulthood and is associated with cardiac and vascular organ damage. Since the organ damage can be irreversible, preventing hypertension in our young people is critically important,” said the lead author, Corinna Koebnick, PhD, of the ...
2023-03-14
WASHINGTON, March 14, 2023 – Burn wounds are notoriously prone to bacterial infection and typically lead to a larger amount of scar tissue than laceration wounds.
In APL Bioengineering, by AIP publishing, researchers from Boston University and Harvard University created a biomimetic model to study wound healing in burn and laceration wounds. They discovered that fibroblasts – normally considered building cells that give shape and strength to tissues and organs – clear away damaged tissue before depositing new material. This ...
2023-03-14
COVID-19 related stress had a greater impact on the mental health of those who were pregnant during the pandemic, compared to those who weren't, new UNSW Sydney research has found.
In a longitudinal study of 742 pregnant participants, Dr Susanne Schweizer from UNSW Science, together with colleagues in Europe and the US, collected data on mental health at multiple time points, both during and after pregnancy.
Their analysis found COVID-19 related stress had the greatest impact on pregnant people who had a tendency to worry, felt lonely, ...
2023-03-14
New research emphasizes how important children’s well-being is for their sense of achievement.
Pupils' sense of how good their results are at school is linked to how well they are thriving, both in the school setting and with the subject matter.
“We’re finding a connection between pupils’ well-being at school and the subject matter, and with how well the pupils think they’re able to do the school work in all the subjects we examined,” says Hermundur Sigmundsson, a professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology's (NTNU) Department ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Global maternal Strep B vaccination program could save millions and prevent thousands of deaths worldwide
