Publications by authors named "J B SOUTHERN"

Purpose: In the setting of an established childhood pneumococcal vaccination programme with immediate initiation and treatment of antiretroviral therapy (ART) for people living with HIV (PLWH), the risk of adult pneumococcal community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is not recently described. We aimed to investigate CAP incidence, recurrence, mortality, risk factors and microbiology before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Participants: Adults aged ≥18 years were enrolled in three South African provinces from March 2019 to October 2021, with a brief halt during the initial COVID-19 lockdown.

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  • The study analyzes invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) characteristics and mortality rates among adults in Israel, focusing on the 20-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV20) and serotypes not included in the previous PCV13.
  • Data from 2009 to 2018 revealed that PCV20non13 serotypes made up 26% of IPD cases, with a 16.2% case-fatality rate (CFR), while PCV13 had a CFR of 21.1%, indicating that PCV20 could potentially reduce IPD mortality.
  • The findings suggest that while PCV20non13 serotypes show comparable mortality rates to PC
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  • De novo protein design aims to create new proteins that evolution hasn't explored, with challenges in developing structural templates to guide the design process.* -
  • Researchers introduced "Genesis," a convolutional variational autoencoder, which effectively learns protein structure patterns and collaborates with trRosetta to design sequences for various protein folds.* -
  • The team demonstrated Genesis's ability to replicate native-like structural features in both known and novel protein folds, showcasing its potential for rapid protein design while addressing designability issues effectively.*
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  • The study aims to assess the incidence and burden of acute lower respiratory tract diseases (aLRTD) in adults visiting primary care, focusing on cases potentially caused by RSV, SARS-CoV-2, and pneumococcus.
  • It involves a cohort of adults registered at six GP practices in Bristol, UK, where researchers will collect data from real-time medical records and patient interactions for detailed analysis.
  • Results will help understand clinical incidence rates, symptom severity, healthcare costs, quality of life impacts, and vaccine prevention opportunities related to aLRTD.
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The Southampton pneumococcal carriage study of children under 5 years old continued during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Here, we present data from October 2018 to March 2023 describing prevalence of pneumococci and other pathobionts during the winter seasons before, during, and after the introduction of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) to prevent severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) transmission. Nasopharyngeal swabs were collected from children attending outpatient clinics at a secondary care hospital and community healthcare sites.

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