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Mphatso Chaponda

Institute: Malawi Liverpool Wellcome Trust Clinical Research Program

Pneumococcal memory B cells in Malawian adults

Streptococcus pneumoniae, commonly known as pneumococcus, is a leading cause of bacterial pneumonia worldwide. The majority of deaths from this bacterial infection occur in low-income countries, such as Malawi. Pneumococcal carriage is an essential prerequisite for infection and life threatening invasive disease. Understanding the immunological factors that prevent establishment of carriage is key in testing and designing novel vaccines.

Since the introduction of the Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine 13 (PCV13) in Malawi in 2011, there has only been a 16% reduction in vaccine type pneumococcus carriage in vaccinated individuals. This shows that there is still persistent community transmission of the pneumococcus, and this threatens the public health benefit of pneumococcal vaccines.

Protection after vaccination relies on both protective pneumococcal-specific memory B cells and pneumococcal-specific antibodies. Pneumococcal-specific memory B cells are important for long-term protection against colonisation and disease. However, there is still a lack of information on the presence and protective potential of pneumococcal polysaccharide-specific memory B cells and antibodies against carriage in a high transmission and disease-burdened settings, such as Malawi.

Therefore, this study focuses on understanding whether pneumococcal polysaccharide-specific memory B cells and antibodies protect against establishment of pneumococcal carriage in a controlled human challenge model of pneumococcal carriage in Malawi.

More about Mphatso here.

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