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PONE-D-24-24851A systematic review to identify research gaps in studies modeling vaccination strategies against Neisseria infectionsPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Metelmann,

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PLOS ONE

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RB performs contract research on behalf of UKHSA for GSK, Pfizer, and Sanofi. RV has received research funding for PHE from GSK and Gilead Sciences in the past. All other authors have declared that no competing interests exist."

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Partly

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: N/A

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

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Reviewer #1: This systematic review focuses on studies on vaccination strategies against Neisseria incidence and antimicrobial resistance. The primarily aim is to identify gaps in research and provide suggestions for future research, including the combination of both meningococcal and gonococcal infections in studies to provide better estimates for vaccine benefits. The review is well written and the topic is relevant.

I have a few minor comments below:

- Typo in Results section paragraph 3.2 where the sentence "Error! Reference source not found." is included.

- Paragraph 3.3.1: Could the authors provide a brief definition of difference between deterministic ODE and stochastic Markov models?

- Table 2: there is a typo for the year of publication which is 2016 and not 2006

- Point 3 in the Discussion section: should be sequelae instead of sequalae?

- Figure 2 is not readable and same for Figure 3

Reviewer #2: This is a very interesting topic for a review. However the paper has major limitations. First of all, the paper only focuses on Men B vaccination and its effect on N. gonorrhoeae. The authors should make the goal of their study more clear in the title and abstract, as they explicitly exclude all studies on meningococcal conjugate vaccine that are not type B. Second, the result section should include more details on the studies included in the review: what is the data used (did they use disease incidence records? were the studies mostly free simulations or did they provide inference based on real data?) , what was the impact of vaccination at the population level? The authors need to describe more in details these results for this review to be useful for researchers.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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A systematic review to identify research gaps in studies modeling MenB vaccinations against Neisseria infections

PONE-D-24-24851R1

Dear Dr. Metelmann,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Michele Tizzoni

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

After reading the revised version of the manuscript and the response to the referees, I am convinced the authors addressed all comments by the referees and the paper can be accepted for publication in PLOS ONE.

Reviewers' comments: