Bexsero® chronicle

Abstract

Neisseria meningitidis causes globally 1.2 million invasive disease cases and 135 000 deaths per year, mostly in infants and adolescents. A century of traditional vaccinology had failed the fight against the serogroup B meningococcus (MenB), mostly prevalent in developed countries. Eighteen years after the publication of the first complete genome sequence from a living organism, thanks to an innovative genome-based approach named 'reverse vaccinology', the first broadly effective MenB vaccine was licensed for use by the European Medical Agency and other authorities, and is being implemented worldwide. Here we review this long and passionate journey, from the disease epidemiology to novel antigen discovery, from vaccine clinical development to public health impact: two decades of scientific and technological innovation to defeat one of the most sudden and devastating invasive diseases.

Meningococcal serogroup Y disease in Europe: Continuation of high importance in some European regions in 2013

“…9 Serogroup W incidence has historically been very low in Europe accounting for only 1-2% 12 when tested pooled serum from vaccinated infants and adolescents against a representative collection of UK MenW strains. Sera from subjects vaccinated with 4CMenB also showed serum bactericidal activity against most of serogroup Y strains tested and isolated from Brazil and European countries.…”

Nanovesicles: Diagnostic and Therapeutic Tools in Nanoscale Medicine

“…It has also found that vesicles from Klebsiella pneumoniae induce humoral, or antibody-generating, and cellular T-cell-engaging immune systems in a recent study. For the current practice, a vesicle-based vaccine to Neisseria meningitides has been already approved for its efficacy in Europe [31].…”

Delivering vaccines to the people who need them most

“…The novelty of reverse vaccinology was not based on growing microorganisms, but on running algorithms to mine DNA sequence information contained in the blueprint of the bacterium [13]. The reverse vaccinology approach was applied for the first time to the bacterial pathogen Neisseria meningitidis serogroup B [14,15], and has led to the development and licensure of the first vaccine for this pathogen, Bexsero (4cMenB) [16]. This is the result of more than 20 years of pioneering research in vaccine development, and should be used as a model for how investments in innovative R&D can lead to life-saving products that have a global impact.…”