Variability of the prevalence of depression in function of sociodemographic and environmental factors: ecological model

Major depression etiopathogenesis is related to a wide variety of genetics, demographic and psychosocial factors, as well as to environmental factors. The objective of this study is to analyze sociodemographic and environmental variables that are related to the prevalence of depression through correlation analysis and to develop a regression model that explains the behavior of this disease from an ecological perspective. This is an ecological, retrospective, cross-sectional study. The target population was 1,148,430 individuals over the age of 16 who were registered in Aragon (Spain) during 2010, with electronic medical records in the community’s primary health care centers. The spatial unit was the Basic Health Area (BHA). The dependent variable was the diagnosis of Depression and the ecological independent variables were: Demographic variables (gender and age), population distribution, typology of the entity, population structure by sex and age, by nationality, by education, by work, by salary, by marital status, structure of the household by number of members, and state of the buildings. The results show moderate and positive correlations with higher rates of depression in areas having a higher femininity index, higher population density, areas with a higher unemployment rate and higher average salary. The results of the linear regression show that aging +75 and rural entities act as protective factors for depression, while urban areas and deficient buildings act as risk factors. In conclusion, the ecological methodology may be a useful tool which, together with the statistical epidemiological analysis, can help in the political decision making process

Development of attenuated live vaccine candidates against swine brucellosis in a non‑zoonotic B. suis biovar 2 background

Brucella is a genus of gram-negative bacteria that cause brucellosis. B. abortus and B. melitensis infect domestic rumi‑ nants while B. suis (biovars 1–3) infect swine, and all these bacteria but B. suis biovar 2 are zoonotic. Live attenuated B. abortus S19 and B. melitensis Rev1 are efective vaccines in domestic ruminants, though both can infect humans. How‑ ever, there is no swine brucellosis vaccine. Here, we investigated the potential use as vaccines of B. suis biovar 2 rough (R) lipopolysaccharide (LPS) mutants totally lacking O-chain (Bs2ΔwbkF) or only producing internal O-chain precursors (Bs2Δwzm) and mutants with a smooth (S) LPS defective in the core lateral branch (Bs2ΔwadB and Bs2ΔwadD). We also investigated mutants in the pyruvate phosphate dikinase (Bs2ΔppdK) and phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (Bs2ΔpckA) genes encoding enzymes bridging phosphoenolpyruvate and the tricarboxylic acid cycle. When tested in the OIE mouse model at the recommended R or S vaccine doses (108 and 105 CFU, respectively), CFU/spleen of all LPS mutants were reduced with respect to the wild type and decreased faster for the R than for the S mutants. At those doses, protection against B. suis was similar for Bs2ΔwbkF, Bs2Δwzm, Bs2ΔwadB and the Rev1 control (105 CFU). As described before for B. abortus, B. suis biovar 2 carried a disabled pckA so that a double mutant Bs2ΔppdKΔpckA had the same metabolic phenotype as Bs2ΔppdK and ppdK mutation was enough to generate attenuation. At 105 CFU, Bs2ΔppdK also conferred the same protection as Rev1. As compared to other B. suis vaccine candidates described before, the mutants described here simultaneously carry irreversible deletions easy to identify as vaccine markers, lack antibiotic-resistance markers and were obtained in a non-zoonotic background. Since R vaccines should not elicit antibodies to the S-LPS and wzm mutants carry immunogenic O-chain precursors and did not improve Bs2ΔwbkF, the latter seems a better R vaccine candidate than Bs2Δwzm. However, taking into account that all R vaccines interfere in ELISA and other widely used assays, whether Bs2ΔwbkF is advantageous over Bs2ΔwadB or Bs2ΔppdK requires experi‑ ments in the natural host

Development of attenuated live vaccine candidates against swine brucellosis in a non‑zoonotic B. suis biovar 2 background

Brucella is a genus of gram-negative bacteria that cause brucellosis. B. abortus and B. melitensis infect domestic rumi‑ nants while B. suis (biovars 1–3) infect swine, and all these bacteria but B. suis biovar 2 are zoonotic. Live attenuated B. abortus S19 and B. melitensis Rev1 are efective vaccines in domestic ruminants, though both can infect humans. How‑ ever, there is no swine brucellosis vaccine. Here, we investigated the potential use as vaccines of B. suis biovar 2 rough (R) lipopolysaccharide (LPS) mutants totally lacking O-chain (Bs2ΔwbkF) or only producing internal O-chain precursors (Bs2Δwzm) and mutants with a smooth (S) LPS defective in the core lateral branch (Bs2ΔwadB and Bs2ΔwadD). We also investigated mutants in the pyruvate phosphate dikinase (Bs2ΔppdK) and phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (Bs2ΔpckA) genes encoding enzymes bridging phosphoenolpyruvate and the tricarboxylic acid cycle. When tested in the OIE mouse model at the recommended R or S vaccine doses (108 and 105 CFU, respectively), CFU/spleen of all LPS mutants were reduced with respect to the wild type and decreased faster for the R than for the S mutants. At those doses, protection against B. suis was similar for Bs2ΔwbkF, Bs2Δwzm, Bs2ΔwadB and the Rev1 control (105 CFU). As described before for B. abortus, B. suis biovar 2 carried a disabled pckA so that a double mutant Bs2ΔppdKΔpckA had the same metabolic phenotype as Bs2ΔppdK and ppdK mutation was enough to generate attenuation. At 105 CFU, Bs2ΔppdK also conferred the same protection as Rev1. As compared to other B. suis vaccine candidates described before, the mutants described here simultaneously carry irreversible deletions easy to identify as vaccine markers, lack antibiotic-resistance markers and were obtained in a non-zoonotic background. Since R vaccines should not elicit antibodies to the S-LPS and wzm mutants carry immunogenic O-chain precursors and did not improve Bs2ΔwbkF, the latter seems a better R vaccine candidate than Bs2Δwzm. However, taking into account that all R vaccines interfere in ELISA and other widely used assays, whether Bs2ΔwbkF is advantageous over Bs2ΔwadB or Bs2ΔppdK requires experi‑ ments in the natural host