Fading immune protection in old age: vaccination in the elderly

Abstract

The function of the immune system declines with age, leading to an increased occurrence and severity of infectious diseases and a decreased response to vaccines. As the thymus gradually loses its ability to replenish the population of naïve T cells, the memory and effector T cells increase in number and dominate the repertoire. The changes in the naïve and memory T cell pool that occur with ageing in man are discussed here, along with a brief update of the knowledge of B cell populations in the elderly.