The Department of Health has recently announced the implementation of annual vaccination for all those aged 18 years and under, with live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV), which is delivered as a nasal spray. The programme will begin in the influenza season, from September 2013, with children aged 24 years of age, and older children being included from the influenza season of 2014. Therefore this study seeks primarily to measure antibody responses to the LAIV vaccination over three subsequent years and will involve six blood samples, six dried blood spots (taken from the end of the blood sample needle) and six oral fluid samples - before and three weeks after each vaccination each year. These samples will allow us to assess how the immune system responds to the vaccinations in terms of the antibodies that are present.~The study will specifically recruit children in previous receipt of Pandemrix, a pandemic influenza vaccine, and those naïve to pandemic influenza vaccination, which will allow the comparison of responses to LAIV between these groups.~The sample size required to answer the primary objective of the study is 200 evaluable children per group. As the study will be conducted over three years the recruitment target will be 500 children across the two groups to allow for the expected attrition of numbers over time.~The investigators will also be assessing how well the vaccines are tolerated and each participant will therefore be asked to complete a health diary for the week following vaccination. They will be asked to record any symptoms, which the investigators will elicit in line with the information in the Summary of Product Characteristics (SPC) as well as any illnesses or visits to their GP or hospital.
The Department of Health has recently announced the implementation of annual vaccination for all those aged 18 years and under, with live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV), which is delivered as a nasal spray. This study seeks primarily to measure antibody responses to the LAIV vaccination over three subsequent years and will involve six blood samples, six dried blood spots (taken from the end of the blood sample needle) and six oral fluid samples - before and three weeks after each vaccination each year. These samples will allow us to assess how the immune system responds to the vaccinations in terms of the antibodies that are present.