Intra-nasal infection of macaques with Yellow Fever (YF) vaccine strain 17D: a novel and economical approach for YF vaccination in man

Investigating new and simple application routes for YF vaccine, four groups of 4-6 rhesus monkeys were vaccinated with live attenuated 17D YF-vaccine. In two groups the vaccine was administered either as spray into the oral c avity, or as an encapsulated form directly into the stomach. Only one out o f eight animals developed a humoral immune response against 17D. In the thi rd group receiving the vaccine intranasally by spray and in the fourth grou p serving as control all ten monkeys developed an immune response. From all except one of these seroconverted monkeys virus could be detected either b y virus reisolation or RT-PCR. All these animals showed a serological immun e response in immunofluorescence and neutralisation test. Parallel to virem ia, an increase of neopterin as an unspecified immune activation marker cou ld be demonstrated for these animals. Intra-nasal application of 17D-vaccin e seems to be a good alternative to subcutaneous immunisation in mass vacci nation campaigns. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.