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Study finds high acute respiratory infection risk for vulnerable babies

Pre-term baby

A The Kids Research Institute Australia study has found babies born pre-term or with a chronic lung disease have an increased risk for acute respiratory infections as children, highlighting the urgent need for early-life intervention.

The leading Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) is respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) that causes a runny nose, cough and breathing difficulties which can infect lungs and lead to bronchiolitis or pneumonia.

RSV is responsible for 100,000 deaths and 3.6 million hospitalisations in children globally each year.

The study, funded by Telethon and Perth Children’s Hospital Research Fund, examined health service use patterns across Western Australia for ARIs in 23,784 children up to eight years, who were admitted to a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) between 2002 and 2013.

Results, recently published in BMC Pediatrics, showed those born extremely pre-term or with a chronic lung disease were high-risk groups for contracting respiratory infections up until primary school age.

For babies born pre-term, the risk of ARI-induced hospitalisation was 6.5 times higher than NICU babies who were not born pre-term.

Similarly, a baby born with a chronic lung disease was five times more likely to suffer a respiratory infection and need hospital treatment, when compared to NICU babies born without lung disease.

Epidemiologist Associate Professor Hannah Moore, from the Wesfarmers Centre of Vaccines and Infectious Diseases and Curtin University’s School of Population Health, said the study emphasised the ongoing burden of ARIs in children who were admitted to NICU as infants.

“The higher rate of acute respiratory infection for children born pre-term or with chronic lung disease that needed hospital treatment was particularly alarming,” Associate Professor Moore said.

The study reminds us of two urgent priorities – the need for early-life vaccines to prevent acute respiratory infections and the need to understand the life-long impact of early infections on later lung health.

“To minimise the risk, it is important to raise awareness about a future RSV vaccine while also reminding parents of non-pharmaceutical measures like handwashing and social distancing from those symptomatic.”

RSV does not induce long-lasting protective immunity meaning babies and children can be infected more than once.

A world-first study at The Kids Research Institute Australia found a new vaccine against RSV was safe and effective for pregnant women which could protect their babies up to 180 days after birth.

With no licensed vaccine available, researchers are also completing the final stages of developing antibody treatments for babies, expected to be available soon.

The article Health service utilisation for acute respiratory infections in infants graduating from the neonatal intensive care unit: a populationbased cohort study can be viewed here.