Comparison of the effectiveness of two mumps vaccines during an outbreak in Switzerland in 1999 and 2000: A case-cohort study

In two recent nation-wide outbreaks of mumps in Switzerland two-thirds of young children with clinical mumps had a history of primary vaccination. On average, measles–mumps–rubella (MMR) vaccination coverage is 80%. Two types of vaccine are commonly used: Jeryl-Lynn and Rubini. The effectiveness of the latter has been questioned in several publications. The authors therefore compared Rubini to Jeryl-Lynn in a case–cohort study. The study included 111 young children with clinical mumps who had been reported to the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health (SFOPH) by primary care physicians of the Swiss Sentinel Surveillance Network (SSSN) between January 1999 and May 2000. Sentinel physicians also sampled 661 children from the same birth cohort as the cases. While we found no evidence for the effectiveness of the Rubini strain, vaccination with the Jeryl-Lynn strain was 70% effective against clinical mumps. Furthermore, children vaccinated with the Rubini strain attended primary health care more frequently with clinical mumps than those who had received Jeryl-Lynn (odds ratio: 2.4; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.3, 4.7). Restricting the analysis to laboratory confirmed cases increased the odds ratio to 18.4 (95% CI: 2.5, 811.2). Our study confirms the low effectiveness of the Rubini strain vaccine in the field. This vaccine should therefore be considered inappropriate for the control and elimination of mumps and its use should be discontinued. As other vaccines with comparable quality and safety standards and a substantially higher effectiveness are available the MMR vaccination program in Switzerland will not be compromised if the use of Rubini is no longer recommended.