Teresa Rubio-Tomás
Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is a bacteria present in the stomach of an important percentage of the population worldwide. Its infection can be asymptomatic but it is linked to gastric inflammation, that may evolve to ulcers and gastric cancer. Here I will focus new data (most of the data is referred to murine models, due to the lack of human studies) regarding advances towards a reliable vaccine against H. pylori that can be used as a prevention for healthy organisms to be infected by the bacteria and/or as a treatment for host organisms already infected. I will focus on articles published in the last year and I will refer to more extensive reviews for more detailed information. Introduction Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is a bacteria that is present in the stomach of a high percentage of humans and, although its infection can be asymptomatic for the host, it can also promote the appareance of inflammation, peptic ulcers and gastric cancer (Graham 2021; FitzGerald and Smith 2021). It has been traditionally treated with antibiotics, but antibody resistant strains have arisen and are an important public health problem (Tshibangu-Kabamba and Yamaoka 2021). In addition to therapeutic options, there have been attempts to eradicate the H. pylori infection, in order to decrease the prevalence of gastric cancer, but it has not been eradicated yet (Moghadam et al. 2020). Furthermore, basic research has been perform aiming to better understand the infection mechanism and murine models have been generated.