Assessing the efficacy of a mixed vaccination strategy against rubella in São Paulo, Brazil.
BACKGROUND
In 1992 a major vaccination strategy against measles-mumps-rubella was introduced in the State of Saão Paulo, Brazil. This strategy was based on mathematical models and comprised a pulse vaccination covering all children aged 1-10 years, followed by the inclusion of this vaccine in the routine calendar at 15 months of age. The present work reports the evaluation of the efficacy of this mixed vaccination strategy.


METHODS
A rubella seroprevalence survey was carried out immediately and one year after the campaign, comprising 4953 children aged 1-15 years.


RESULTS
We show that average rubella seroprevalence increased from 0.40 to 0.97 and that the reported number of congenital rubella syndrome (CRS) cases dropped dramatically.


CONCLUSIONS
The mixed vaccination strategy adopted against rubella has proved to be very effective in reducing the number of CRS cases in São Paulo.
Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil.
E
E
Massad
R S
RS
Azevedo-Neto
M N
MN
Burattini
D M
DM
Zanetta
F A
FA
Coutinho
H M
HM
Yang
J C
JC
Moraes
C S
CS
Pannuti
V A
VA
Souza
A S
AS
Silveira
D000293:Adolescent; D000914:Antibodies, Viral / Q000032:analysis; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007074:Immunoglobulin G / Q000032:analysis; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D008458:Measles Vaccine; D022542:Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccine; D009108:Mumps Vaccine; D015995:Prevalence; D012410:Rubella Syndrome, Congenital / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000276:immunology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D012411:Rubella Vaccine; D012412:Rubella virus / Q000276:immunology; D016036:Seroepidemiologic Studies; D014611:Vaccination; D017778:Vaccines, Combined
D000914:Antibodies, Viral; D007074:Immunoglobulin G; D008458:Measles Vaccine; D022542:Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccine; D009108:Mumps Vaccine; D012411:Rubella Vaccine; D017778:Vaccines, Combined; C040901:rubella antibodies