1. An increasing, potentially measles-susceptible population over time after vaccination in Korea
- Author
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Sung Soon Kim, Hee-Dong Jung, Hye Eun Eom, A-Reum Kim, You-Jin Kim, Hae Ji Kang, Su Jin Kim, Young Woo Han, Joo Ae Kim, and Ok Young Park
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,0301 basic medicine ,Adolescent ,Measles Vaccine ,030106 microbiology ,Population ,Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay ,Viral Plaque Assay ,Antibodies, Viral ,Measles ,Herd immunity ,Young Adult ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Neutralization Tests ,Seroepidemiologic Studies ,Immunity ,Republic of Korea ,medicine ,Humans ,Seroprevalence ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Child ,education ,education.field_of_study ,General Veterinary ,General Immunology and Microbiology ,business.industry ,Incidence (epidemiology) ,Age Factors ,Infant, Newborn ,Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health ,Infant ,Middle Aged ,medicine.disease ,Vaccination ,Infectious Diseases ,Child, Preschool ,Immunology ,Molecular Medicine ,Female ,Measles vaccine ,business - Abstract
In Korea, measles occurs mainly in infants12months of age, who are unvaccinated. In addition, vaccine populations, including adolescents and young adults, can become infected though importation. Thus, the question arises whether the current level of herd immunity in Korea is now insufficient for protecting against measles infection.Age-specific measles seroprevalence was evaluated by performing enzyme immunoassays and plaque reduction-neutralization tests on 3050 subjects aged 0-50years (birth cohort 1964-2014) and 480 subjects aged 2-30years (birth cohort 1984-2012).The overall seropositivity and measles antibody concentrations were 71.5% and 1366mIU/mL, respectively. Progressive decline in antibody levels and seropositivity were observed over time after vaccination in infants, adolescents, and young adults. The accumulation of potentially susceptible individuals in the population was confirmed by comparing data from 2010 and 2014 seroprevalence surveys. The statistical correlation between measles incidence and measles seronegativity was determined.Waning levels of measles antibodies with increasing time post-vaccination suggests that measles susceptibility is potentially increasing in Korea. This trend may be related to limitations of vaccine-induced immunity in the absence of natural boosting by the wild virus, compared to naturally acquired immunity triggered by measles infection. This study provides an important view into the current measles herd immunity in Korea.
- Published
- 2017
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