By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
The International Vaccine Institute (IVI) in Seoul said Thursday that a vaccine against typhoid fever is highly effective for young children and promotes herd immunity among non-vaccinated neighbors.
Typhoid fever is a main cause of illness and death in the developing world, killing about 216,000 to 600,000 people annually. Multidrug-resistant salmonella typhi has spread to many parts of the world, limiting the ability to treat typhoid fever with available antibiotics.
The results of the joint research by the IVI and the National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases (NICED) was published in the July 23 edition of the New England Journal of Medicine.
People suffering from typhoid fever in developing countries can use the Vi vaccine as it is affordable and a single dose is sufficient.
So far, use of Vi vaccines has been limited, as researchers have doubted the efficiency of the vaccines in children. There have also been doubts regarding Vi's ability to confer herd immunity, or protection of unvaccinated residents living in highly vaccinated areas.
IVI, a non-profit organization established to develop new vaccines for people in developing countries researched the vaccine in cooperation with the NICED, based in India.