News release

From: Adelaide University

The meningococcal B (MenB) vaccine could provide protection against more than one disease, with new research linking it to a significant reduction in the risk of gonorrhoea in young Territorians.

The study, led by Adelaide University in partnership with NT Health, found that two doses of the 4CMenB vaccine were associated with a 38% lower risk of gonorrhoea notifications in young people aged 14 to 22 years.

Researchers believe this may be because the bacteria that cause meningococcal disease and gonorrhoea are closely related, and it’s likely the vaccine triggers an immune response to help the body recognise and prevent both infections.

“This study adds to growing evidence that the MenB vaccine may offer modest protection against gonorrhoea when provided to young people, in addition to its established role in preventing invasive meningococcal B disease,” said Adelaide University Professor Helen Marshall, who is the principal investigator of this study and Clinical Research Director at the Women’s and Children’s Health Network.

With assistance from NT Health, the MenB vaccine was offered to all 14-19 year old Territorians. Notification and immunisation data were analysed from 30,650 adolescents and young people across the Northern Territory and Ngaanyatjarra Lands in Western Australia.

Researchers also followed 2,526 participants over 12 months to examine whether the vaccine reduced the presence of meningococcal bacteria in the throat but found no decrease over time. The MenB vaccine directly protects people from group B meningococcal disease but does not reduce the spread of the bacteria between people.

The research paper has been published in Open Forum Infectious Diseases and is the first to report on the effectiveness of the vaccine in a real-world setting with higher adolescent disease prevalence of both invasive meningococcal disease and gonorrhoea.

“These are real-world findings from a high-burden setting of both invasive meningococcal disease and gonorrhoea,” said Professor James Ward, co-investigator on the study and Director of the University of Queensland Poche Centre for Indigenous Health.

“The outcomes add to international evidence that MenB vaccination may have benefits beyond meningococcal disease prevention, especially in young people.

“The rollout of the vaccine should now be another tool in the toolbox to reduce unacceptably high rates of both invasive meningococcal disease and gonorrhoea.”

Gonorrhoea is a sexually transmitted infection which can lead to infertility. In Australia, the number of cases has doubled over the past 10 years, with notifications of drug-resistant strains also rising.

“Gonorrhoea is becoming harder to treat because of increasing antimicrobial resistance, which highlights the importance of identifying additional prevention strategies,” said Professor Marshall.

The researchers caution that the gonorrhoea analysis was observational, meaning some potentially important factors such as sexual behaviour, healthcare engagement and testing frequency were not available.

Despite this, the findings are likely to be of strong interest to policymakers, given the urgent need for new strategies to reduce gonorrhoea and slow the spread of antimicrobial resistance.

A funded MenB vaccination program for infants as well as Year 9 students was introduced in the Northern Territory last year following promising results from this trial and others globally.

The NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence in Neisseria Disease control, led by Professors Marshall and Ward, will continue to help clarify the vaccine’s longer-term impact on both gonorrhoea and meningococcal disease.

This study was funded by the NHMRC Partnership Projects Grant, The Hospital Research Foundation Group, the Women’s and Children’s Hospital Foundation and Adelaide University.