Decay Rates of Maternal Tetanus, Diphtheria, and Pertussis Antibody Levels in Early and Moderate-to-Late Preterm and Term Infants at Birth and at Two Months

Maarten M Immink; Nicoline A T van der Maas; Mireille N Bekker; Hester E de Melker; Gerco den Hartog; Nynke Y Rots; Pieter G M van Gageldonk; Floris Groenendaal; Elisabeth A M Sanders

doi:10.1093/ofid/ofae717

Decay Rates of Maternal Tetanus, Diphtheria, and Pertussis Antibody Levels in Early and Moderate-to-Late Preterm and Term Infants at Birth and at Two Months

Open Forum Infect Dis. 2024 Dec 10;12(1):ofae717. doi: 10.1093/ofid/ofae717. eCollection 2025 Jan.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Centre for Infectious Disease Control, National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM), Bilthoven, The Netherlands.
² Department of Obstetrics, Wilhelmina Children's Hospital, University Medical Center Utrecht, and Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
³ Laboratory of Medical Immunology, Radboudumc, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
⁴ Department of Neonatology, Wilhelmina Children's Hospital, University Medical Center Utrecht, and Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
⁵ Department of Pediatric Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Wilhelmina Children's Hospital, University Medical Center Utrecht, and Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.

Abstract

A post hoc analysis of maternally derived antibodies at birth and age 2 months following second trimester maternal Tdap vaccination between 20 and 24 weeks' gestational age (GA) showed a faster decay rate of Tdap-related immunoglobulin G in early preterms born before 32 weeks' GA compared with moderate-to-late preterms and full-terms. This is different from previous studies and merits further research.

Keywords: antibody decay; full-term; immunogenicity; maternal immunization; pertussis; preterm.