Certain types of gut bacteria can hinder the efficacy of the rotavirus vaccine, according to researchers at the Institute for Biomedical Sciences at Georgia State University. The findings, led by Drs. Vu L.
Ngo and Andrew T. Gewirtz, published in the journal Cellular and Molecular Gastroenterology and Hepatology , indicate that gut microbiota, particularly the trillions of bacteria that live in an individual's gut, can influence rotavirus vaccine responsiveness and sometimes result in children remaining prone to rotavirus infection and severe disease despite having been vaccinated. Rotavirus is a virus that spreads easily among infants and young children, causing severe diarrhea, vomiting, fever, and abdominal pain .
Children who are infected with rotavirus disease can become dehydrated and may require hospitalization. Rotavirus vaccines have proven highly effective at protecting children in the United States and Europe but have relatively low efficacy in some low-income countries. Rotavirus vaccines are orally administered, live, attenuated viruses that must infect their host's intestine to elicit protective immunity.
The protection provided by rotavirus vaccines is highly dissimilar among individuals leading the researchers to hypothesize that the composition of gut microbiota, amidst which the viral vaccine must infect, influences rotavirus vaccine efficacy. In this study, the researchers investigated the influence of human microbiomes on rotavirus vaccination by administe.