Prof Andrew Pollard
| Address: | Children's Hospital, Room 02-46-07 |
| Tel: | +44 (0)1865 234226 (PA) or 01865 231693 (clinical secretary) |
| Email: | |
| Website: | Childhood Bacterial Meningitis Vaccine Programme / External webpage |
Principal areas of research Paediatric vaccines, meningitis vaccines, typhoid vaccines, the development of the immune response. |
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Biography
Andrew J Pollard, FRCPCH PhD, is Professor of Paediatric Infection and Immunity at the University of Oxford, Director of the Oxford Vaccine Group in the University Department of Paediatrics, Jenner Investigator, James Martin Senior Fellow, Fellow of St Cross College and Honorary Consultant Paediatrician at the Children’s Hospital, Oxford, UK. He chaired the UK’s NICE meningitis guidelines development committee in 2008-10. He obtained his medical degree at St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School, University of London in 1989 and trained in Paediatrics at Birmingham Children’s Hospital, UK, specialising in Paediatric Infectious Diseases at St Mary’s Hospital, London, UK and at British Columbia Children’s Hospital, Vancouver, Canada. He obtained his PhD at St Mary’s Hospital, London, UK in 1999 studying immunity to Neisseria meningitidis in children and proceeded to work on anti-bacterial innate immune responses in children in Canada before returning to his current position at the University of Oxford, UK in 2001. Current research activities include clinical trials of new and improved vaccines for children, invasive bacterial diseases in children in Nepal, studies of cellular and humoral immune responses to glycoconjugate vaccines, research on the genetic control of the human immune response and investigations on meningococcal host-pathogen interactions and development of a serogroup B meningococcal vaccine. His publications include over 200 manuscripts and books on various topics in paediatrics, and infectious diseases.
Research
Clinical trials and epidemiological research: The Oxford Vaccine Group
Vaccines are a kyy component of global public health policy and are particularly important in the defence of the health of young children. Despite the challenges of so doing, new and improved vaccines must be evaluated in the target population of infants and young children prior to licensure. The Oxford Vaccine Group has enrolled over 10,000 children and young people into clinical trials in the Thames Valley since 2001. The clinical trials undertaken in the UK since 2001 include phase IV studies of a meningitis C vaccine and a pneumococcal conjugate vaccine; a phase II study of a new pneumococcal vaccine for infants; phase II and III studies of quadrivalent meningococcal vaccines and group B meningococcal vaccines; phase II studies of a preschool vaccine; evaluation of a novel avian and swine influenza vaccines in adults and children; study of different schedules for immunisation of the elderly against pneumococcal infection.
Epidemiological studies have included evaluation of carriage of Haemophilus influenzae type b and Streptococcus pneumonia throughout childhood in the UK and Nepal, surveillance of invasive bacterial infections in children admitted to Patan hospital in Kathmandu. Qualitative research studies have evaluated parental views about immunization, vaccine research and influenza vaccines. The group has a particular interest in the ethics of consent in childhood and is working with the Centre for Ethics on studies evaluating the process of consent in school age children.
Laboratory research programme
The laboratory research programme has used the clinical material provided by the clinical trials group to drive a series of projects evaluating the developing immune system in the infant. The group has specifically focused on the development of B cell memory after immunization with glycoconjugate vaccines and has found correlations between the generation of memory during priming and the persistence of the immune response. A major programme is focussed on the development of a novel serogroup B meningococcal vaccine from preclinical studies through to clinical trials. In a ground-breaking study, the group are developing a human typhoid model for the evaluation of typhoid vaccines. The group also undertakes sero-epidemiological studies and is examining acquisition of natural immunity to various organisms in the UK and Nepal. A bank of DNA is being collected form children enrolled in vaccine trials and several studies of the genetic control of the immune response following immunisation are currently underway.
Key Publications
Waddington CS, Walker WT, Oeser C, Reiner A, John T, Wilkins S, Casey M, Eccleston PE, Allen RJ, Okike I, Ladhani S, Sheasby E, Hoschler K, Andrews N, Waight P, Collinson AC, Heath PT, Finn A, Faust SN, Snape MD, Miller E, Pollard AJ. Safety and immunogenicity of AS03B adjuvanted split virion versus non-adjuvanted whole virion H1N1 influenza vaccine in UK children aged 6 months-12 years: open label, randomised, parallel group, multicentre study. BMJ. 2010 May 27;340:c2649. doi: 10.1136/bmj.c2649.
Perrett KP, Winter AP, Kibwana E, Jin C, John TM, Yu LM, Borrow R, Curtis N, Pollard AJ. Antibody persistence after serogroup C meningococcal conjugate immunization of United kingdom primary-school children in 1999-2000 and response to a booster: a phase 4 clinical trial. Clin Infect Dis. 2010 Jun 15;50(12):1601-10.
Sadarangani M, Pollard AJ, Serogroup B Meningococcal Vaccines - an unfinished story. Lancet Infectious Diseases. 2010 Feb;10(2):112-24
Pollard AJ, Perrett KP, Beverley PC, Maintaining protection against invasive bacteria in childhood with protein–polysaccharide conjugate vaccines. Nature Reviews of Immunology . 2009 Mar;9(3):213-20.
Snape MD, Perrett KP, Ford KJ, John TM, Pace D, Yu L, Langley JM, McNeil S, Dull P, Ceddia F, Anemona A, Halperin SA, Dobson S, Pollard AJ. A randomized controlled trial of a novel tetravalent meningococcal glycoconjugate vaccine in infants. JAMA 2008 Jan 9;299(2):173-84.
Diggle L, Deeks JJ, Pollard AJ, The effect of needle size on the immunogenicity and reactogenicity of vaccines in infancy: a randomised controlled trial. British Medical Journal, 2006 Sep 16;333(7568):571. Epub 2006 Aug 4.
Kelly DF, Snape MD, Clutterbuck EC, Green S, Snowden C, Beverley P, Borkowski A , Moxon ER and Pollard AJ, Persistent circulating antigen-specific memory B-cells are induced by protein-polysaccharide serogroup C meningococcal conjugate vaccine but not by plain serogroup C meningococcal polysaccharide vaccine. Blood 2006;108(8):2642-7
