| emergency vaccination against epidemic meningitis in ghana: implications for the control of meningococcal disease in west africa. | recurrent epidemics of meningococcal disease have been reported throughout the african meningitis belt since description of the disease in 1912. meningooccal polysaccharide vaccines can effectively prevent disease but the optimum strategy for their use in this setting has been controversial. we used data from an outbreak of meningococcal disease in northern ghana in 1997 to assess the potential effect of different vaccination strategies. | 2000 | 10615888 |
| prospective study of a serogroup x neisseria meningitidis outbreak in northern ghana. | after an epidemic of serogroup a meningococcal meningitis in northern ghana, a gradual disappearance of the epidemic strain was observed in a series of five 6-month carriage surveys of 37 randomly selected households. as serogroup a neisseria meningitidis carriage decreased, an epidemic of serogroup x meningococcal carriage occurred, which reached 18% (53/298) of the people sampled during the dry season of 2000, coinciding with an outbreak of serogroup x disease. these carriage patterns were unr ... | 2002 | 11865418 |
| an outbreak of serotype 1 streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis in northern ghana with features that are characteristic of neisseria meningitidis meningitis epidemics. | the kassena-nankana district (knd) of northern ghana lies in the african meningitis belt, where epidemics of bacterial meningitis have been reoccurring every 8-12 years. these epidemics are generally caused by neisseria meningitidis, an organism that is considered to be uniquely capable of causing meningitis epidemics. | 2005 | 15962213 |
| clonal waves of neisseria colonisation and disease in the african meningitis belt: eight- year longitudinal study in northern ghana. | the kassena-nankana district of northern ghana lies in the african "meningitis belt" where epidemics of meningococcal meningitis have been reoccurring every eight to 12 years for the last 100 years. the dynamics of meningococcal colonisation and disease are incompletely understood, and hence we embarked on a long-term study to determine how levels of colonisation with different bacterial serogroups change over time, and how the patterns of disease relate to such changes. | 2007 | 17388665 |
| genetic diversification of neisseria meningitidis during waves of colonization and disease in the meningitis belt of sub-saharan africa. | although neisseria meningitidis is a highly variable organism, most invasive disease is caused by a minority of genotypes. hypervirulent lineages have been identified and their pandemic spread has been traced. during a longitudinal meningococcal colonization study in a district of northern ghana clonal waves of carriage and disease were observed. genetic diversification of genoclouds was analysed by pulsed field gel electrophoretic (pfge) analysis of isolates from healthy carriers and from menin ... | 2007 | 17531357 |
| a phase ii, randomized study on an investigational dtpw-hbv/hib-menac conjugate vaccine administered to infants in northern ghana. | combining meningococcal vaccination with routine immunization in infancy may reduce the burden of meningococcal meningitis, especially in the meningitis belt of africa. we have evaluated the immunogenicity, persistence of immune response, immune memory and safety of an investigational dtpw-hbv/hib-menac conjugate vaccine given to infants in northern ghana. | 2008 | 18478093 |