Rotateq promises protection against rotavirus

Washington, October 27: Showing clear benefits, Merck & Co.'s Rotateq, a vaccine against rotavirus, a leading cause of severe diarrhea and vomiting among infants and children, managed to scale down the number of infections by at least two-thirds, a latest research by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Quest Diagnostics Inc. unfolded.

The oral vaccine also managed to cut down on average rates of hospitalizations of children with rotavirus infections by more than 70 percent in some parts of the United States since rotavirus vaccinations began in 2006, the report concluded.

Administered in three-dose-series, at 2, 4 and 6 months of age, the vaccine also helps in disrupting the spread of the disease in older children not immunized against the infection.

“We saw marked declines of rotavirus in every age group, including those 2 to 6 years old for whom the vaccine isn't recommended,” Jay Lieberman, medical director of infectious diseases for the Focus Diagnostics unit at Madison, New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics asserted.

The performance results of the drug were presented on October 25 at the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy conference in Washington.

Rotavirus, a viral infection that causes severe diarrhea and vomiting in infants and young children afflicts an estimated 2.7 million children each year in the United States. Categorized into seven species, A, B, C, D, E, F and G, Rotavirus A is the most common causing over 90 percent of infections in humans.

Commonly transmitted through fecal-oral route, the infection induces gastroenteritisdefine, leading to severe diarrhea and sometimes death through dehydration. While the infection clears itself in a week’s time, severe infections, however, require hospitalization.

Fortunately, as each episode of infection helps the body to develop immunity against it, subsequent infections are less severe and adults are rarely affected.