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. 2024 Feb 27;12(3):246.
doi: 10.3390/vaccines12030246.

Poliovirus-Neutralizing Antibody Seroprevalence and Vaccine Habits in a Vaccine-Derived Poliovirus Outbreak Region in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2018: The Impact on the Global Eradication Initiative

Megan Halbrook  1 , Adva Gadoth  1 , Patrick Mukadi  2 , Nicole A Hoff  1 , Kamy Musene  1 , Camille Dzogang  2 , Cyrus Shannon Sinai  3 , D'Andre Spencer  4 , Guillaume Ngoie-Mwamba  5 , Sylvia Tangney  1 , Frank Salet  6 , Michel Nyembwe  5 , Michel Kambamba Nzaji  5 , Merly Tambu  2 , Placide Mbala  2 , Trevon Fuller  7 , Sue K Gerber  7 , Didine Kaba  8 , Jean Jacques Muyembe-Tamfum  2 , Anne W Rimoin  1
Affiliations

Poliovirus-Neutralizing Antibody Seroprevalence and Vaccine Habits in a Vaccine-Derived Poliovirus Outbreak Region in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2018: The Impact on the Global Eradication Initiative

Megan Halbrook et al. Vaccines (Basel). .

Abstract

Despite the successes in wild-type polio eradication, poor vaccine coverage in the DRC has led to the occurrence of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus outbreaks. This cross-sectional population-based survey provides an update to previous poliovirus-neutralizing antibody seroprevalence studies in the DRC and quantifies risk factors for under-immunization and parental knowledge that guide vaccine decision making. Among the 964 children between 6 and 35 months in our survey, 43.8% (95% CI: 40.6-47.0%), 41.1% (38.0-44.2%), and 38.0% (34.9-41.0%) had protective neutralizing titers to polio types 1, 2, and 3, respectively. We found that 60.7% of parents reported knowing about polio, yet 25.6% reported knowing how it spreads. Our data supported the conclusion that polio outreach efforts were successfully connecting with communities-79.4% of participants had someone come to their home with information about polio, and 88.5% had heard of a polio vaccination campaign. Additionally, the odds of seroreactivity to only serotype 2 were far greater in health zones that had a history of supplementary immunization activities (SIAs) compared to health zones that did not. While SIAs may be reaching under-vaccinated communities as a whole, these results are a continuation of the downward trend of seroprevalence rates in this region.

Keywords: Democratic Republic of the Congo; IPV; OPV; SIAs; cVDPV; nOPV2; poliovirus; serosurvey; vaccine coverage.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Map of Haut Lomami and Tanganyika provinces and selected study site locations.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Prevalence of serologic profiles among participants with seroprotective titers (N = 613).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Polio seroprevalence estimates from 2016 to 2018.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Odds of seroreactivity by health zone pool and age group. Model used is estimating odds of seroreactivity by health zone history adjusted by age and sex (non-significant and not shown). Reference health zone: Kabalo and Kongolo, which had no cVDPV2 cases and 0 SIAs. Reference age: 6–11 months old.
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