Modeling the impact of high-dose versus standard-dose influenza vaccines on antibody breadth and vaccine efficacy
Slides: https://www.andreashandel.com/presentations/
2025-10-15
Introduction
- Influenza vaccines are good, but could be better.
- The vaccine is especially sub-par in older adults.
- Enhanced vaccines are now recommended for older adults.
- One enhancement is to use a higher dose of antigen: Fluzone High-Dose (HD) versus Fluzone Standard-Dose (SD).
Motivation
- Fluzone HD is more immunogenic compared to Fluzone SD for the strains contained in the vaccine.
- Unclear if Fluzone HD also induces a broader antibody response against other/heterologous strains.
Motivation
- We explored the impact of dose on antibody breadth (and strength) using data from a vaccine cohort.
SD versus HD vaccine study
All individuals >=65y
Vaccine Strains
“Raw” data - homologous responses
“Raw” data - heterologous responses
The model (brms code)
Bayesian, hierarchical model. Nesting of strains/individuals/seasons.
See paper supplement for all the math.
H1N1 antibodies after HD/SD vaccine
H3N2 antibodies after HD/SD vaccine
Overall strain-specific response
Overall season response
Conclusions
- Overall, the HD vaccine seems to induce a somewhat better response compared to the SD vaccine.
- The effect is not strong, and varies by vaccine strain/season.
- It might be worth to further tweak/increase the dose.
Acknowledgements
- Other co-authors, NIH
Questions?
https://phdcomics.com/
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Modeling the impact of high-dose versus standard-dose influenza vaccines on antibody breadth and vaccine efficacy Slides: https://www.andreashandel.com/presentations/ Andreas Handel 2025-10-15