The expected number of background disease events during mass immunization in China

Youxin Wang; Lijuan Wu; Xinwei Yu; Feifei Zhao; Alyce Russell; Manshu Song; Wei Wang

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0071818

The expected number of background disease events during mass immunization in China

PLoS One. 2013 Aug 20;8(8):e71818. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0071818. eCollection 2013.

Authors

Youxin Wang¹, Lijuan Wu, Xinwei Yu, Feifei Zhao, Alyce Russell, Manshu Song, Wei Wang

Affiliation

¹ School of Public Health, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China ; Municipal Key Laboratory of Clinical Epidemiology, Beijing, China ; School of Medical Sciences, Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia.

Abstract

It is critical to distinguish events that are temporarily associated with, but not caused by, vaccination from those caused by vaccination during mass immunization. We performed a literature search in China National Knowledge Infrastructure and Pubmed databases. The number of coincident events was calculated based on its incidence rate and periods after receipt of a dose of hypothesized vaccine. We included background incidences of Guillain-Barré syndrome, anaphylaxis, seizure, sudden adult death syndrome, sudden cardiac death, spontaneous abortion, and preterm labour or delivery. In a cohort of 10 million individuals, 7.71 cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome would be expected to occur within six weeks of vaccination as coincident background cases. Even for rare events, a large number of events can be expected in a short period because of the large population targeted for immunization. These findings may encourage health authorities to screen the safety of vaccines against unpredictable pathogens.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Abortion, Spontaneous / epidemiology
Abortion, Spontaneous / immunology
Adolescent
Adult
Anaphylaxis / epidemiology
Anaphylaxis / immunology
Child
Child, Preschool
China / epidemiology
Death, Sudden, Cardiac / epidemiology
Death, Sudden, Cardiac / etiology
Female
Guillain-Barre Syndrome / epidemiology*
Guillain-Barre Syndrome / immunology
Humans
Incidence
Infant
Influenza A Virus, H1N1 Subtype / immunology*
Influenza Vaccines / adverse effects*
Influenza, Human / immunology
Influenza, Human / prevention & control*
Influenza, Human / virology
Male
Mass Vaccination*
Obstetric Labor, Premature / epidemiology
Obstetric Labor, Premature / etiology
Pandemics / prevention & control*
Pregnancy
Seizures / epidemiology
Seizures / etiology
Young Adult

Substances

Influenza Vaccines

Grants and funding

The study was funded by the Chinese Government Major Grants administrated under the 5-year Plan (2012BAI37B03, 2009ZX10004-903, 2008ZX100-01-003), National Natural Science Foundation of China (81001281), Importation and Development of High-Calibre Talents Project of Beijing Municipal Institutions, and the Grant of the Municipal Key Laboratory of Clinical Epidemiology, Beijing China (2012LCLB03). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.