§ Mr. Ian StewartTo ask the Secretary of State for Health when his Department changed its advice given in paragraph 24.4.5 of the 1996 advice booklet, "Immunisation Against Infectious Diseases", that local reactions and pyrexias occur less often after acellular pertussis vaccine than after whole cell vaccine. [99446]
§ Yvette CooperThe advice that local reactions and pyrexia occur less often after acellular pertussis vaccine than after whole cell vaccine was first included in the 1996 edition of the Department of Health memorandum "Immunisation Against Infectious Diseases". This information had recently become available from a departmental funded study that directly compared different acellular vaccines with the United Kingdom whole cell vaccine. The study was subsequently published and copies of the paper have been placed in the Library (Miller E. et al. Effect of schedule on reactogenicity and antibody persistence of acellular and whole cell pertussis vaccines: value of laboratory tests as predictors of clinical performance. Vaccine 1997; 15(1): 51–60.).