Gee, I wonder how much weight an article written with an “unsupported educational grant from Merck” would give to the possibility that the high rate of Hepatitis B in Asia is due to contaminated/reusable needles?  So much more profitable to be part of the problem and then part of the “solution”… (See: http://www.vaccinationnews.com/dailynews/august2001/docsdirtyneedlesspreadhep.htm) - SM

 

http://pediatrics.medscape.com/Medscape/pediatrics/AskExperts/2002/01/PED-ae43.html

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Newborn Response to Hepatitis B Vaccine

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Do transplacental hepatitis B antibodies blunt a newborn's response to the hepatitis B vaccine? Should a newborn's hepatitis B vaccine schedule be altered if the mother is hep b immune?

Dr. G Ajit

BackResponse

from Sandor Feldman, MD, 01/08/02
Neither the Centers for Disease Control[1] nor the American Academy of Pediatrics[2] recommends any change in the newborn's hepatitis B vaccine schedule if the mother is immune to hepatitis B virus. In a study by Szmuness and colleagues,[3] coadministration of hepatitis B immune globulin and hepatitis B vaccine did not interfere with response to the vaccine. This is the basis for no recommended change in the neonatal hepatitis B vaccine schedule.

In Asia, where rates of hepatitis B infection reach 80%[4] of the population, it has been found that neonatal hepatitis B vaccine has a dramatic impact on the incidence of and death from childhood infection.[5] This further supports the lack of interference of maternal antibody and the neonatal response to hepatitis B vaccine.

References

  1. Atkinson W, Wolfe C, Humiston S, Nelson R, eds. Centers for Disease Control. Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine -- Preventable Diseases. 6th ed. Atlanta, Ga: Centers for Disease Control; 2000:207-229.
  2. Pickering L, ed. Report of the Committee on Infections Diseases. 25th ed. Elk Grove, Ill; American Academy of Pediatrics; 2000:289-305.
  3. Szmuness W, Oleszko WR, Stevens, CE Goodman. Passive-active immunisation against hepatitis B: immunogenicity studies in adult Americans. Lancet. 1981;1:575-577.
  4. Goldstein S, Fiore AE. Toward the global elimination of hepatitis B virus transmission. J Pediatr. 2001;139:343-345.
  5. Kao JH, Hsu HM, Shau WY, Chang MH, Chen DC. Universal hepatitis B vaccination and the decreased mortality from fulminant hepatitis in infants in Taiwan. J Pediatr. 2001;139:349-352.

 

  

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