A new review of the research literature led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health shows that cholera vaccines provide substantial protection for adults but provide significantly less protection for children under age 5, a population particularly at risk for dying from this diarrheal disease.
The review, which considered seven clinical trials and six observational studies, found that the standard two-dose vaccine regimen reduced the risk of getting cholera on average by 58 percent for adults but only by 30 percent for children under age 5.
The findings could help inform policymakers on how and when to use the vaccine, particularly in outbreak settings such as the ongoing epidemic in Yemen, which has seen an estimated 400,000 suspected cases and as many as 1,900 associated deaths since the outbreak began in April.
The findings appear online in the journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases.