Inactivated Hepatitis A Vaccines
- Stanley M. Lemon, MD
Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text.
Excerpt
In this issue of JAMA, Innis and colleagues1 describe a remarkable clinical trial of a new, formalin-inactivated hepatitis A vaccine performed among 40 119 children in Thailand. An impressive effort, this study compared the frequency of hepatitis A in children aged 1 to 16 years after two or three doses of either the hepatitis A vaccine developed by SmithKline Beecham Biologicals, Rixensart, Belgium, or a recombinant hepatitis B vaccine. The hepatitis A vaccine was found to be highly effective in preventing symptomatic illness associated with elevated serum alanine aminotransferase and positive IgM antibodies to hepatitis A virus (HAV). No serious adverse reactions were noted after administration of more than 109 000 doses. This is the second clinical trial to document efficacy of an investigational, formalin-inactivated hepatitis A vaccine; it follows the 1992 report of a similar vaccine developed by Merck Research Laboratories, West Point, Pa,
See also p 1328.
Footnotes
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Reprint requests to Department of Medicine, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7030 (Dr Lemon).
