Tetanus vaccine impairs tetanus-specific responses in filariasis.

2004 JUL 7 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- Tetanus vaccination impairs tetanus-specific cellular and humoral responses in human lymphatic filariasis.

"To investigate the consequences of the impaired parasite-specific immune response in lymphatic filariasis, the effect of concurrent Wuchereria bancrofti infection on the immune response to tetanus toxoid (TT) following tetanus vaccination was studied in 20 asymptomatic microfilaremic (MF) patients, 20 patients with chronic lymphatic obstruction/elephantiasis (chronic pathology [CP]), and 10 endemic normal (EN) control individuals at baseline and at 3 and 6 months after TT vaccination," investigators in India and the United States report.

"Peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) proliferative responses to 17 before vaccination were not significantly different between the EN control and CP groups, but the MF group showed significantly lower baseline proliferative responses to TT compared with either the EN or CP group," reported Suba Nookala at Anna University in India and collaborators in India and the U.S. "Six months following vaccination, the change in proliferative response to TT was significantly greater in the EN and CP groups than in the MF group."

"This difference in proliferative response was reiterated in the gamma interferon (IFN-gamma) response in the EN group, in that they increased IFN-gamma production by 400% at 6 months, in contrast to that seen in the filaria-infected groups," stated the scientists. "In contrast to the IFN-gamma responses, PBMCs from the MF group produced significantly ...