Studies of adenoidal-pharyngeal-conjunctival vaccines in volunteers.

Abstract

It has been shown that adenoidal-pharyngeal-conjunctival (APC) viruses are responsible for certain hitherto undifferentiated respiratory illnesses and that they have been associated with certain external diseases of the eye. 1 These viruses produce neutralizing antibodies in human serum. 1 b Nine human and two simian adenoidal-pharyngeal-conjunctival virus serotypes have been delineated to date. 2 When types 1, 3, 4, and 5 are swabbed on the conjunctivas of susceptible volunteers, they regularly produce a moderately severe, self-limited catarrhal conjunctivitis, together with systemic symptoms similar to those of pharyngoconjunctival fever. Volunteers having specific serum antibodies are resistant to the disease. 3 This report describes initial studies with volunteers, studies designed to determine the ability of a formaldehyde-inactivated and a heat-in-activated type 3 APC virus vaccine to ( a ) produce specific neutralizing antibodies in the serum and ( b ) to prevent or modify artificially induced infection and disease. MATERIALS AND METHODS Preparation of Vaccines.— The J.