A natural experiment in Kenya reveals durable immunosuppressive effects of early childhood malaria: a longitudinal cohort study
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Background
Chronic malaria exposure has been proposed to modulate immune function, but its long-term effects on antibody-mediated responses to unrelated pathogens remain poorly defined. Whether these effects persist beyond periods of active infection, and how early-life exposure shapes humoral immunity over time, is not well understood.
Methods
We leveraged a natural experiment in coastal Kenya - where two regions (Junju and Ngerenya) diverged sharply in malaria transmission from around 2004 - to evaluate the long-term immunological consequences of malaria exposure in childhood. Using a protein microarray platform, we measured IgG responses to vaccine and pathogen antigens in 123 children sampled longitudinally over a 15-year period. Active weekly malaria surveillance enabled precise reconstruction of individual exposure histories.
Results
IgG responses to Plasmodium falciparum apical membrane antigen 1 (AMA1) tracked closely with clinical malaria episodes, confirming the ability of the microarray platform to detect biologically meaningful variation in antigen-specific immunity. Despite comparable vaccination histories, children from the high malaria transmission setting (Junju) exhibited persistently lower measles-specific IgG levels than children from the low-transmission setting (Ngerenya), a pattern validated by ELISA. At 10 years of age, Junju children showed significantly reduced antibody levels to a wide range of unrelated pathogens, including Bordetella pertussis , CMV, rubella, and measles. Within the Ngerenya cohort, children with documented early-life malaria had broadly lower IgG responses at age 10 compared to malaria-naïve peers, despite identical geography, vaccines, and follow-up duration.
Conclusions
These findings suggest that malaria exposure during early childhood is linked with durable suppression of antibody responses to unrelated pathogens and vaccines. This effect persists long after infection and may partially explain the overall diminished long-term vaccine effectiveness in malaria-endemic settings.
