Long-term Kinetics of Vibriocidal Antibody Responses After Vibrio cholerae Infection in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Abstract

Interpretation of seroepidemiology studies of cholera relies on knowledge of antibody kinetics, which are not well known in African populations. We performed vibriocidal antibody assays on 212 serum samples from 115 patients with culture-positive cholera (median age, 8 years) in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, which were collected at enrollment and 3 to 449 days after. Vibriocidal responses peaked at 7 to 40 days after symptom onset, with 89.5% waning to a titer ≤160 by 180 days. We used a bayesian exponential decay model to show an 88% probability of the posterior distribution supporting a faster decay in children ≤5 years of age.