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Review
. 2022 Mar 8;40(11):1525-1533.
doi: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2021.01.068. Epub 2021 Feb 12.

Can what have we learnt about BCG vaccination in the last 20 years help us to design a better tuberculosis vaccine?

Hazel M Dockrell  1 , Egle Butkeviciute  2
Affiliations
Review

Can what have we learnt about BCG vaccination in the last 20 years help us to design a better tuberculosis vaccine?

Hazel M Dockrell et al. Vaccine. .

Abstract

The BCG vaccine will, in 2021, have been in use for 100 years. Much remains to be understood, including the reasons for its variable efficacy against pulmonary tuberculosis in adults. This review will discuss what has been learnt about the BCG vaccine in the last two decades, and whether this new information can be exploited to improve its efficacy, by enhancing its ability to induce either antigen-specific and/or non-specific effects. Many factors affect both the immunogenicity of BCG and its protective efficacy, highlighting the challenges of working with a live vaccine in man, but new insights may enable us to exploit better what BCG can do.

Keywords: BCG; BCG vaccination; TB vaccines; Trained immunity; Tuberculosis.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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