Salmonella Enteritidis with double deletion in phoP fliC and a competitive exclusion culture elicit substantial additive protective effects against Salmonella exposure in newly hatched chicks

A live Salmonella Enteritidis vaccine (SE 147N ΔphoP fliC), able to express both a homologous intestinal colonisation-inhibition effect and a systemic invasion-inhibition effect, was tested for its potential to generate a postulated additive protective effect in case of combined application with a competitive exclusion (CE) culture against Salmonella exposure in very young chicks. Both, SE 147N ΔphoP fliC and the CE culture alone were highly protective against systemic and intestinal colonisation of the challenge strain in case of moderate Salmonella exposure, consequently, additive protective effects in combined use could not be detected. However, in case of high Salmonella Enteritidis challenge with 106 cfu/bird at day 3 of life the combination of the ΔphoP fliC vaccine and the CE culture resulted in a protective effect much more pronounced than either of the single preparations and most substantial compared to untreated control birds. The term additive protective effects reflects the recognition that exclusion effects by gut flora cultures and inhibition effects by Salmonella vaccines are caused by different mechanisms.