Background: Each year at least one million children worldwide die of pneumococcal infections. The development of bacterial resistance to antimicrobials adds to the difficulty of treatment of diseases and emphasizes the need for a preventive approach. Newborn vaccination schedules could substantially reduce the impact of pneumococcal disease in immunized children, but does not have an effect on the morbidity and mortality of infants less than three months of age. Pneumococcal vaccination during pregnancy may be a way of preventing pneumococcal disease during the first months of life before the pneumococcal vaccine administered to the infant starts to produce protection.
Objectives: To assess the effect of pneumococcal vaccination during pregnancy for preventing infant infection.
Search methods: We searched the Cochrane Pregnancy and Childbirth Group's Trials Register (31 December 2011) and reference lists of retrieved studies.
Selection criteria: Randomized controlled trials in pregnant women comparing pneumococcal vaccine with placebo or doing nothing or with another vaccine to prevent infant infections.
Data collection and analysis: Two review authors independently assessed trials for inclusion, methodological quality and extracted data using a data collection form. Data were checked for accuracy. We contacted study authors for additional information.
Main results: Seven trials were included, but only five trials (579 participants) contributed data. There was no evidence that pneumococcal vaccination during pregnancy reduces the risk of neonatal infection (risk ratio (RR) 0.66; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.30 to 1.46; two trials, 241 pregnancies). Although the data suggest an effect in reducing pneumococcal colonization in infants by 16 months of age (RR 0.33; 95% CI 0.11 to 0.98; one trial, 56 pregnancies), there was no evidence of this effect in infants at two to three months of age (RR 1.13; 95% CI 0.46 to 2.78; two trials, 146 pregnancies) or by six to seven months of age (RR 0.66; 95% CI 0.20 to 2.17; two trials, 144 pregnancies). No significant difference for tenderness at the injection site between women who received pneumococcal vaccine and those who received control vaccine (RR 3.20; 95% CI 0.32 to 31.54; two trials, 130 women).
Authors' conclusions: There is insufficient evidence to assess whether pneumococcal vaccination during pregnancy could reduce infant infections.