Meningitis vaccine offers some defence against gonorrhea, study finds

Researchers studying a massvaccination campaign against meningitis have found a surprisingside-effect the shots also offered moderate protection againstgonorrhea.

The study,published in The Lancet medical journal, mark the first timeimmunization has shown anyprotection against gonorrhea, and points to new avenues in thesearch for a gonorrhea vaccine, scientists said.

"This new research could be game-changing,"said LindaGlennie, an expert at the Meningitis Research Foundation who wasnot directly involved in the study.

Gonorrhea has become an increasingly urgent global healthproblem in recent years as strains of the bacterial infectionhave developed high levels of drug resistance.

The World Health Organization warned last week that sometotally drug-resistance superbug strains of the disease alreadypose a major threat.

In thestudy, publishedin the journalPLoS Medicine,the WHOcalls theincreasein drug-resistant gonorrhea a"serious situation." The organization said avaccine "will ultimately be the only sustainable way to achieve control."

No gonorrhea vaccine

Yet so far, efforts to develop a gonorrhea vaccine haveyielded disappointing results. Four potential shots have reachedthe clinical trial stage, but none has been effective, The Lancet said in a press release.

In New Zealand, around onemillion people under age 20received a meningitis vaccine known as MeNZB during a 2004-06immunization program. This provided a valuable opportunity totest for cross-protection, the scientists explained.

For their study, the team used data from 11 sexual health clinics for all people aged 15 to 30 who had been diagnosed with gonorrhea or chlamydia, or both, and who had also been eligible to be immunized against meningitis in the 2004-06 campaign.

They found that those who had been vaccinated were significantly less likely to have gonorrhea. And taking into account factors such as ethnicity, deprivation, geographical area and gender, having the MeNZB vaccine reduced the incidence ofgonorrhea by around 31 per cent.

Those who had been vaccinated and contracted gonorrhea were less likely to have a more severe form of the disease, compared with people who weren't vaccinated.

Helen Petousis-Harris, who co-led the study at the University of Auckland, said the findings "provide experimental evidence and a proof of principle" that meningitis vaccines might offer moderate cross-protection against gonorrhea.

"Our findings could inform future vaccine development for both the meningococcal and gonorrhea vaccines," she said.

Although the diseases have very different symptoms and transmission modes, she said, the bacteria Neisseria gonorrheae and Neisseria meningitidis have an up to 90 per cent genetic match, providing a biologically plausible mechanism.