Background: Currently there is no vaccine available in use against any form of leishmaniases worldwide.
Objective: To assess potential of a live-attenuated Leishmania major promastigates, for protection against a challenge infection with L. major in BALB/c mice.
Design: A laboratory based study.
Setting: Study was carried out at Centre for Biotechnology Research and Development, Kenya Medical Research Institute, Nairobi.
Results: The greatest protection against challenge with L. major was seen in mice immunised with live parasites (P < 0.001) compared to vaccinations with heat killed or soluble antigens. In general, immunised mice produced high level of antileishmanial antibodies and T cell stimulation to their respective antigens.
Conclusions: Our live-attenuated parasites produced by serial sub-culture of L. major parasites 118 times showed the capacity to induce appropriate cell-mediated immune responses and protection against L. major infection in BALB/c mice. Data also suggests that these parasites do not revert to virulence when injected subcutaneously in mice.