Pierre Van Damme

University of Antwerp | UA · Vaccine & infectious disease institute

T cell-based diagnostic tools identify pathogen exposure, but lack differentiation between recent and historic exposures in acute infectious diseases. Here, T cell receptor (TCR) RNA sequencing was performed on HLADR+/CD38+ CD8+ T cell subsets of hospitalized COVID-19 patients (n = 30) and healthy controls (n = 30; ten of whom had previously been e...

Infection with hepatitis D virus leads to liver disease and cancer most rapidly of all hepatitis viruses. However, knowledge about hepatitis D remains poor and the burden and impact are underestimated, even though some 12–15 million people mainly in low‐ and middle‐income countries may be affected. Its epidemiology is changing, with increasing migr...

In this paper, we discuss challenges associated with implementing a policy for Ancillary Care (AC) for related and unrelated (serious) adverse events during an Ebola vaccine trial conducted in a remote area of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Conducting clinical trials in resourceconstrained settings can raise context-related challenges that h...

Introduction: A serosurvey among health care providers (HCPs) and frontliners of an area previously affected by Ebola virus disease (EVD) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was conducted to assess the seroreactivity to Ebola virus antigens. Methods: Serum samples were collected in a cohort of HCPs and frontliners (n = 698) participant...

Background In response to recent Ebola epidemics, vaccine development against the Zaire ebolavirus (EBOV) has been fast-tracked in the past decade. Healthcare providers and frontliners working in Ebola endemic areas are at high risk of contracting and spreading the virus. Methods This study assessed the safety and immunogenicity of the 2-dose hete...

The immune system acts as an intricate apparatus that is dedicated to mounting a defense and ensures host survival from microbial threats. To engage this faceted immune response and provide protection against infectious diseases, vaccinations are a critical tool to be developed. However, vaccine responses are governed by levels that, when interroga...

Our study aims to investigate the dynamics of conventional memory T cells (Tconv) and regulatory T cells (Treg) following activation, and to explore potential differences between these two cell types. To achieve this, we developed advanced statistical mixed models and mathematical models of ordinary differential equations (ODE), which allowed us to...

Abstract Background The inconsistent European vaccine trial landscape rendered the continent of limited interest for vaccine developers. The VACCELERATE consortium created a network of capable clinical trial sites throughout Europe. VACCELERATE identifies and provides access to state-of-the-art vaccine trial sites to accelerate clinical developmen...

Objectives To validate a rapid serological test (RST) for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies used in seroprevalence studies in healthcare providers, including primary healthcare providers (PHCPs) in Belgium. Design A phase III validation study of the RST (OrientGene) within a prospective cohort study. Setting Primary care in Belgium. Participants Any general...

Background Several organizations, including governments, (inter)national public health organizations and vaccine manufactures are currently considering how adult vaccination can be further improved to increase health impact and promote a lifelong approach to vaccination. Despite many organizations thinking about ways to improve adult vaccination,...

Background: Non-typeable Haemophilus influenzae has become increasingly important as a causative agent of invasive diseases following vaccination against H. influenzae type b. The emergence of antibiotic resistance underscores the necessity to investigate typeable non-b carriage and non-typeable H. influenzae (NTHi) in children. Methods: Nasopha...

Cervical cancer due to human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is a leading cause of mortality among women in low-resource settings. Many Sub-Saharan African countries have introduced HPV vaccination programs at the national level in the last few years. However, countries are struggling to maintain sustainable coverage. This study focuses on the intro...

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic highlights that complications and mortality associated with infectious diseases increase with age. Various vaccines are recommended for adults, but coverage rates remain suboptimal. Although co-administration would improve vaccine uptake and timely immunization, this is not routine practice in adults. We review key dat...

Background: The pan-European VACCELERATE network aims to implement the first transnational harmonized and sustainable vaccine trial Volunteer Registry, being a single entry point for potential volunteers of large-scale vaccine trials across Europe. This work exhibits a set of harmonized vaccine trial–related educational and promotional tools for th...

Background: Chatbots are increasingly used to support COVID-19 vaccination programs. Their persuasiveness may depend on the conversation-related context. Objective: To investigate the moderating role of the conversation quality and chatbot expertise cues in the effects of expressing empathy/autonomy-support by COVID-19 vaccine chatbots. Methods...

Prior studies have identified genetic, infectious, and biological associations with immune competence and disease severity; however, there have been few integrative analyses of these factors and study populations are often limited in demographic diversity. Utilizing samples from 1,705 individuals in 5 countries, we examined putative determinants of...

Background: Lassa fever is a substantial health burden in west Africa. We evaluated the safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of a recombinant, live-attenuated, measles-vectored Lassa fever vaccine candidate (MV-LASV). Methods: This first-in-human phase 1 trial-consisting of an open-label dose-escalation stage and an observer-blinded, randomi...

Background: The high complexity of biological systems arises from the large number of spatially and functionally overlapping interconnected components constituting them. The immune system, which is built of reticular components working to ensure host survival from microbial threats, presents itself as particularly intricate. A vaccine response is l...

Background Pregnant women, foetuses and infants are at risk of infectious disease-related complications. Maternal vaccination is a strategy developed to better protect pregnant women and their offspring against infectious disease-related morbidity and mortality. Vaccines against influenza, pertussis and recently also COVID-19 are widely recommended...

Background: Inactivated trivalent poliovirus vaccine (IPV) induces humoral immunity, which protects against paralytic poliomyelitis but does not induce sufficient mucosal immunity to block intestinal infection. We assessed the intestinal immunity in healthy adults in Belgium conferred by a co-formulation of IPV with the mucosal adjuvant double mut...

Introduction A serosurvey among health care providers (HCPs) and frontliners of an area previously affected by Ebola virus disease (EVD) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was conducted to assess the seroreactivity to Ebola virus antigens. Methods Serum samples were collected in a cohort of HCPs and frontliners (n=698) participants in t...

Vaccination during pregnancy is effective in providing protection against vaccine-preventable diseases in young infants. Here, timely (second rather than third trimester) pertussis vaccination during pregnancy is recommended, conveying protection against Bordetella pertussis in both term and preterm born infants. Additionally, breastfeeding during...

BACKGROUND The pan-European VACCELERATE network aims to implement the first transnational harmonized and sustainable vaccine trial Volunteer Registry, being a single entry point for potential volunteers of large-scale vaccine trials across Europe. This work exhibits a set of harmonized vaccine trial–related educational and promotional tools for the...

Objectives: Pneumococcal conjugate vaccines (PCVs) effectively reduce infection and asymptomatic carriage of Streptococcus pneumoniae vaccine serotypes. In 2016, Belgium replaced its infant PCV13-programme by a four-year period of PCV10. Concomitantly, S. pneumoniae serotype carriage was monitored together with carriage of other nasopharyngeal pat...

Background Transcriptome profiling of blood cells is an efficient tool to study the gene expression signatures of rheumatic diseases. This study aims to improve the early diagnosis of pediatric rheumatic diseases by investigating patients’ blood gene expression and applying machine learning on the transcriptome data to develop predictive models. M...

Objectives To estimate the prevalence, incidence and longevity of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 among primary healthcare providers (PHCPs). Design Prospective cohort study with 12 months of follow-up. Setting Primary care in Belgium. Participants Any general practitioner (GP) working in primary care in Belgium and any other PHCP from the same GP...

To map the public information about COVID-19 vaccines and vaccine trials in Europe, we have compiled an inventory of online communication materials from official sources (e.g., governments, public agencies, and NGOs) via directed online research. While information for the general public was abundant across Europe, we found a large variation in numb...

BACKGROUND Chatbots are increasingly used to support COVID-19 vaccination programs. Their persuasiveness may depend on the conversation-related context. OBJECTIVE This study aims to investigate the moderating role of the conversation quality and chatbot expertise cues in the effects of expressing empathy/autonomy support using COVID-19 vaccination...

This work presents a joint spatial modeling framework to improve estimation of the spatial distribution of the latent COVID‐19 incidence in Belgium, based on test‐confirmed COVID‐19 cases and crowd‐sourced symptoms data as reported in a large‐scale online survey. Correction is envisioned for stochastic dependence between the survey's response rate...

Objectives To estimate the prevalence, incidence, and longevity of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 among primary healthcare providers (PHCPs). Design Prospective cohort study with 12 months of follow-up. Setting Primary care in Belgium Participants Any general practitioner (GP) working in primary care in Belgium and any other PHCP from the same GP...

Background In the general population, the seroconversion rate after primary vaccination with two doses of an anti-SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine reaches nearly 100%, with significantly higher antibody titers after mRNA-1273 vaccination compared to BNT162b2 vaccination. Here, we performed a systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the antibody respon...

Since the largest Ebola outbreak in West Africa (2013–2016) highlighted the potential threat of the Ebola virus to the world, several vaccines have been under development by different pharmaceutical companies. To obtain vaccine licensure, vaccine trials assessing the safety, immunogenicity and efficacy of new vaccines among different populations (e...

Presence of SARS-CoV-2 was monitored in nasopharyngeal samples from young children aged 6-30 months attending day-care centres (DCCs) in Belgium from May 2020-February 2022. SARS-CoV-2 carriage among DCC children was only detected from November 2021, after emergence of Delta and Omicron variants, in 9 of the 42 DCCs screened. In only one DCC, two c...

Background One strategy to develop a universal influenza virus vaccine is to redirect the immune system to the highly conserved haemagglutinin stalk domain by sequentially administering vaccines expressing chimeric (c) haemagglutinins with a conserved stalk domain and divergent head domain, to which humans are naive. We aimed to assess the reactoge...

Background To control epidemic waves, it is important to know the susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 and its evolution over time in relation to the control measures taken. Aim To assess the evolving SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence and seroincidence related to the first national lockdown in Belgium, we performed a nationwide seroprevalence study, stratified by...

Background COVID-19 mortality, excess mortality, deaths per million population (DPM), infection fatality ratio (IFR) and case fatality ratio (CFR) are reported and compared for many countries globally. These measures may appear objective, however, they should be interpreted with caution. Aim We examined reported COVID-19-related mortality in Belgi...

Governments worldwide are relying on the COVID-19 vaccines as the solution for ending the coronavirus pandemic and the resulting crisis. Although scientific progress in the development of a vaccine has been astonishing, policymakers are facing an extra hurdle as increasingly more people appear to be hesitant in their intention to take such a vaccin...

Introduction: National SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence data provide essential information about population exposure to the virus and help predict the future course of the epidemic. Early cohort studies have suggested declines in levels of antibodies in individuals associated with, for example, illness severity, age and comorbidities. This protocol focus...

Antigen recognition through the T cell receptor (TCR) αβ heterodimer is one of the primary determinants of the adaptive immune response. Vaccines activate naïve T cells with high specificity to expand and differentiate into memory T cells. However, antigen-specific memory CD4 T cells exist in unexposed antigen-naïve hosts. In this study, we use hig...

In the general population, the seroconversion rate after primary vaccination with two doses of anti-SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine reaches nearly 100%, with significantly higher antibody titers after mRNA-1273 vaccination compared to BNT162b2 vaccination. Here, we performed a systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the antibody response after two-d...

With the roll-out of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines, it has become clear that vaccinating the majority of the population worldwide will be the most important element to control and manage the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Several reports have shown diminished immunogenicity of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)...

Background A year after the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, the global rollout of vaccines gives us hope of ending the pandemic. Lack of vaccine confidence, however, poses a threat to vaccination campaigns. This study aims at identifying individuals’ characteristics that explain vaccine willingness in Flanders (Belgium), while also describing trend...

Introduction Maternal antibody interference of the infant’s humoral immune responses raises some concern to the strategy of maternal Tdap (tetanus, diphtheria, acellular pertussis [aP]) vaccination. This study assessed the impact of maternal Tdap antibodies on the infant’s pertussis-specific T lymphocyte responses following infant vaccination with...

Background OVX836 is a recombinant protein vaccine targeting the highly conserved influenza nucleoprotein (NP), which could confer broad-spectrum protection against this disease. Methods This was a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind, dose-escalating, single center first-in-human study, conducted in 36 healthy adults aged 18-49 years. Twe...

Importance There is a need for improved immunogenicity of hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccines among young adults with risk of infection. Objectives To demonstrate manufacturing equivalence of a 3-antigen (3A) HBV vaccine, evaluate noninferiority of seroprotection rate (SPR) of 3A-HBV vs single-antigen (1A) HBV after 2 and 3 vaccine doses, and compare...

p>Importance: There is a need for improved immunogenicity of hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccines among young adults with risk of infection. Objectives: To demonstrate manufacturing equivalence of a 3-antigen (3A) HBV vaccine, evaluate noninferiority of seroprotection rate (SPR) of 3A-HBV vs single-antigen (1A) HBV after 2 and 3 vaccine doses, and comp...

Hepatitis B is caused by the hepatitis B virus (HBV), which infects the liver and may lead to chronic liver disease, including cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. HBV represents a worldwide public health problem, causing major morbidity and mortality. Affordable, safe, and effective, hepatitis B vaccines are the best tools we have to control an...

In this study of the humoral immune response after the SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccination, low seroconversion rates were noted in both kidney transplant recipients and dialysis patients after first dose administration. While in DP the seroconversion rate levelled up to 92.8% after a second dose of SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccination, KTR stayed behind with a sero...

Introduction This article describes the protocol of an Ebola vaccine clinical trial which investigates the safety and immunogenicity of a two-dose prophylactic Ebola vaccine regimen comprised of two Ebola vaccines (Ad26.ZEBOV and MVA-BN-Filo) administered 56 days apart, followed by a booster vaccination with Ad26.ZEBOV offered at either 1 year or 2...

Background: Primary health care providers (PHCPs) are assumed to be at high risk of a COVID-19 infection, as they are exposed to patients with usually less personal protective equipment (PPE) than other frontline health care workers (HCWs). Nevertheless, current research efforts focussed on the assessment of COVID-19 seroprevalence rates in the ge...

Hepatitis A is an acute, usually self-limiting disease of the liver caused by hepatitis A virus (HAV). HAV is transmitted from person to person, primarily by the fecal–oral route. The incidence of hepatitis A is closely related to socioeconomic development, and seroepidemiological studies show that prevalence of anti-HAV antibodies in the general p...

Hepatitis B is caused by the hepatitis B virus (HBV), which infects the liver and may lead to chronic liver disease, including cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). HBV causes worldwide major morbidity and mortality. In 2019, an estimated 14 million people in the World Health Organization European Region were chronically infected with hepat...

The diversity of the European Region is reflected not only in the cultures and languages but also by economies and health systems. The economic, cultural, and historical differences have all contributed to the resulting diversity seen in the health systems and health governance among them, differences that have contributed to the wide variation of...

Although the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic is lasting for more than 1 year, the exposition risks of health-care providers are still unclear. Available evidence is conflicting. We investigated the prevalence of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 in the staff of a large public hospital with multiple sites in the Ant...

For more than a decade human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine have been implemented in most high-income countries, and more recently also in several low- and middle-income countries. The vaccines are safe and their impact and effectiveness in preventing HPV vaccine type infection and associated diseases has been thoroughly established. Currently, the p...

Sabin-strain oral polio vaccines (OPV) can, in rare instances, cause disease in recipients and susceptible contacts or evolve to become circulating vaccine-derived strains with the potential to cause outbreaks. Two novel type 2 OPV (nOPV2) candidates were designed to stabilize the genome against the rapid reversion that is observed following vaccin...

Introduction National severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) seroprevalence data provides essential information about population exposure to the virus and helps predict the future course of the epidemic. Early cohort studies have suggested declines in levels of antibodies in individuals, associated with, for example, illness s...

Implementing an Ebola vaccine trial in a remote area in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and being confronted with a dysfunctional health care system and acute unmet health needs of participants, ethical considerations were made regarding the ancillary care obligations of the sponsor and researchers. Spurred by the occurrence of non-rela...

Differences in innate immune 'imprinting' between vaccine adjuvants may mediate dissimilar effects on the quantity/quality of persisting adaptive responses. We compared antibody avidity maturation, antibody/memory B cell/CD4+ T cell response durability, and recall responses to non-adjuvanted fractional-dose antigen administered 1-year post-immuniza...

Background Limited data exist on the impact of maternal Tetanus, Diphtheria, acellular Pertussis (aP) (Tdap) vaccination for preterm born infants. We report its effect at birth and on antibody-mediated immune responses to a DTaP-IPV-HB-PRP~T vaccine in preterm compared to term infants. Methods Women delivering at term or prematurely were either va...

Background & Aims Approximately 5‐10% of the general population respond inadequately to licensed recombinant hepatitis B vaccines. We assessed the immunogenicity and safety of a new HBAI20 vaccine, consisting of a new AI20 adjuvant (20µg recombinant human IL‐2 attached to 20µg aluminum hydroxide) in combination with HBVaxPro®‐10µg. Methods In a do...

Background The seroprotection rate (SPR) of hepatitis B vaccination in adults is suboptimal. The aim of this study was to compare the SPR of a tri-antigenic hepatitis B vaccine (TAV), with a mono-antigenic vaccine (MAV) in adults of all ages. Methods This was a multicentre, double-blind, phase 3, randomised controlled trial (PROTECT) comparing the...

Chronic otitis media with effusion (OME) has been associated with a shift in microbiome composition and microbial interaction in the upper respiratory tract (URT). While most studies have focused on potential pathogens, this study aimed to find bacteria that could be protective against OME through a case-control microbiome study and characterizatio...

Host cell DNA methylation analysis in urine provides promising triage markers for women diagnosed with a high-risk (HR) human papillomavirus (HPV) infection. In this study, we have investigated a panel of six host cell methylation markers (GHSR, SST, ZIC1, ASCL1, LHX8, ST6GALNAC5) in cervicovaginal secretions collected within the first part of the...

The potential of first-void (FV) urine as a non-invasive liquid biopsy for detection of human papillomavirus (HPV) DNA and other biomarkers has been increasingly recognized over the past decade. In this study, we investigated whether the volume of this initial urine stream has an impact on the analytical performance of biomarkers. In parallel, we e...