Christian Bjerregård Øland

The early-life mortality remains high in developing countries and nearly half of under-5 deaths occur in the neonatal period.1 Neonatal sepsis caused by a range of different bacterial agents, against which specific vaccines are not available, is a leading cause of death.2 A strategy to reduce early-life infection severity is the at-birth provision of live vaccines such as Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) and Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG).3 In a series of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) conducted...

Highlights • Up to 3 years of age, children who had DTP as most recent vaccination had higher mortality than both unvaccinated and MV-vaccinated children. • Children who received oral polio vaccine (OPV) without DTP had lower mortality than children who received DTP with or without OPV. • Children who received DTP and OPV had lower mortality than children who received DTP without OPV.