Yellow Fever Vaccine-Associated Disease

Abstract

This chapter provides an overview of the recently described vaccine-associated adverse events and also provides an estimate of the rate of such events. In the early development stages of the vaccine, neurotropic disease (also known as postvaccinal encephalitis) among children was the most common serious adverse event associated with yellow fever vaccines. Of the eight patients, five had renal failure that required hemodialysis and five died. In two fatal cases, yellow fever antigen was identified by immunohistochemistry in liver biopsies in one case and multiple tissue specimens in the other. All vaccine recipients during the most recent 12-month period for which complete information was available were categorized by age group. Yellow fever virus was isolated from the blood of one person 13 days after vaccination. Yellow fever vaccine-associated adverse events among U.S. citizens that were reported to Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) from 1990 through 2002 were categorized as yellow fever vaccine-associated viscerotropic disease or yellow fever vaccine-associated neurotropic disease and classified by age group. Like the current analysis of the rate of yellow fever vaccine adverse events, this estimate was based on passive reporting and the number of vaccine doses distributed as provided by the manufacturer.