Effect of nutrient supplementation on the acquisition of humoral immunity to Plasmodium falciparum in young Malawian children

Table 3 Magnitude and prevalence of antibodies in 432 children at 6 and 18 months

Antigen tested/Pf^a isolate	Antibody level^b		P value^d	Antibody seropositivity^c (%)		P value^e
Antigen tested/Pf^a isolate	6 months	18 months	P value^d	6 months	18 months	P value^e
MSP1^f	0.97 [0.38, 2.89]	2.80 [0.83, 6.35]	< 0.0001	128 (29.6)	236 (54.6)	< 0.0001
MSP2^g	2.14 [1.31, 3.59]	2.95 [0.92, 9.12]	< 0.0001	114 (26.3)	117 (27.0)	0.1004
EBA175^h	2.50 [1.44, 4.13]	3.73 [2.19, 18.73]	< 0.0001	48 (11.1)	51 (11.8)	0.5764
Rh2A9ⁱ	5.49 [2.01, 33.78]	8.5 [4.68, 14.29]	0.2829	14 (3.2)	122 (28.2)	< 0.0001
Schizont	1.92 [0.84, 6.99]	3.32 [1.44, 6.89]	0.2522	202 (46.7)	233 (53.9)	0.0314
E8B	0.20 [0.03, 0.45]	0 [0, 0.21]	< 0.0001	105 (25.2)	34 (7.8)	< 0.0001
R29	0.18 [0, 0.63]	0 [0, 0.11]	< 0.0001	37 (9.1)	16 (3.7)	0.0016
3D7	0.23 [0.01, 0.53]	0 [0, 0.29]	< 0.0001	94 (22.2)	36 (8.3)	< 0.0001

^a Plasmodium falciparum
^bAntibody level presented as a percentage of the positive control showing the median and interquartile range
^cSeropositivity defined as sample mean optical density or fluorescence intensity > mean + 3 standard deviations of the negative controls
^dP value calculated using Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed-ranks test
^eP value calculated using McNemar’s test
^fMerozoite surface protein 1
^gMerozoite surface protein 2
^hErythrocyte binding antigen 175
ⁱReticulocyte binding protein homologue 2A
Significant P values <0.05 are indicated in italics

ISSN: 1475-2875