History of diphtheria vaccine development

Abstract

Diphtheria was a major cause of death among children until the beginning of the nineteenth century. The introduction in the 1920s of formaldehyde-detoxified diphtheria toxin for mass immunization, led to the control of diphtheria that is considered to be the first conquest of vaccination. Pioneering scientific discoveries were the isolation of Corynebacterium diphtheriae and of the secreted toxin responsible for disease, diphtheria toxin. The simultaneous progress on bacteriology and immunology brought to the development of detoxified toxins as safe and efficacious subunit vaccines that are still used in current vaccines. In this chapter we will review the main scientific breakthroughs that led to the development of the first vaccine against diphtheria and to the control of this disease.