Rotavirus vaccine — time to act

Rotavirus vaccines are finally available, and introducing them into the routine vaccination schedule will have a significant impact on the health of children fter a dramatic false start, oral rotavirus vaccines are now available to prevent severe, dehydrating diarrhoea in small children. Rotavirus infection in children can be as severe as cholera in adults, but affects a group who cannot complain. Since its discovery in Australia in 1973, rotavirus has become accepted as the single most common cause of severe diarrhoea in children worldwide. It still kills over 500 000 young children each year. In Australia, it is estimated that 10 000 children require hospitalisation annually 1,2 (more than 4000 actually coded for proven rotavirus 3), and as Schultz reports in this issue of the Journal (page 354), the impact on Indigenous children is especially severe. 4 Oral rehydration has greatly reduced mortality, but the World Health Organization recognises the potential of rotavirus vaccines to further reduce under-5-year mortality rates, Goal 4 of the Millenium Development Goals. 5 It is exciting to have two efficacious oral rotavirus vaccines, ROTARIX (GlaxoSmithKline [GSK], Boronia, VIC) and RotaTeq (Merck/CSL, Parkville, VIC) licensed this year in Australia. Each has been extensively tested in placebo-controlled trials of more than 60 000 participants. Both vaccines prevented severe disease, and reduced the need for hospitalisation by 85%–94%. There was a reassuring lack of intussusception, a rare (one in 10 000– 32 000) event associated with RotaShield, the first licensed rotavirus vaccine, which led to its withdrawal from the United States market in 1999, just 12 months after its introduction. 6 Re-analysis of the data suggested that the intussusception risk emerged in infants receiving the first vaccine dose after 3 months of age. 7 Thus both GSK and Merck/CSL state that the first dose should be administered before that time. Several issues remain to be resolved with these two new vaccines. Efficacy has not been established in developing countries. Availability will depend on distribution (including the need for a cold chain), the ability to piggyback rotavirus vaccines with other routine vaccinations, and manufacturing capacity. The greatest uncertainty is the cost of the vaccine. Current prices exceed $200 per course in the private market. While tier pricing and subsidisation by international agencies for poorer countries is being considered, it is not clear whether these mechanisms will sustain programs in most parts of the world. Hence, other candidate vaccines linked …