Influenza A virus facilitates Streptococcus pneumoniae transmission and disease

DA Diavatopoulos; KR Short; JT Price; JJ Wilksch; LE Brown; DE Briles; RA Strugnell; OL Wijburg

Journal article

Influenza A virus facilitates Streptococcus pneumoniae transmission and disease

DA Diavatopoulos, KR Short, JT Price, JJ Wilksch, LE Brown, DE Briles, RA Strugnell, OL Wijburg

FASEB Journal | Published : 2010

DOI: 10.1096/fj.09-146779

Abstract

Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus) kills ∼1.6 million people annually. Pneumococcal infections predominantly manifest as pneumonia, sepsis, meningitis, and otitis media. S. pneumoniae is also a member of the normal nasopharyngeal flora, colonizing up to 80% of children. Infection with influenza A virus (IAV) has been associated with both pneumococcal disease and transmission. However, to date no animal model has been available to investigate the role of IAV in the spread of S. pneumoniae. Here we investigate pneumococcal-influenza synergism with a particular focus on the role of IAV on pneumococcal transmission. Infant mice were colonized with S. pneumoniae and subsequently infected..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Jonathan Wilksch Author

Lorena Brown Author

Dick Strugnell Author

Odilia Wijburg Author

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Grants

Awarded by National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (NHMRC)

Funding Acknowledgements

The authors thank Mrs. Emily Fairmaid (University of Melbourne, Melbourne, VIC, Australia) for assistance with the HI tests, Dr. Reinhold Bruckner (University of Kaiserslautern, Kaiserslautern, Germany) for the kind gift of the pPP2 plasmid, Dr. Vyvyan Salisbury (University of the West of England, Bristol, UK) for providing the pAL2 plasmid, and Prof. J. Paton and Dr. D. Ogunniyi (University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA, Australia) for technical help and advice. This work was supported by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (NHMRC) grants 400011 and 284214. O.L.W. is an NHMRC R. D. Wright Fellow.