We conducted a systematic literature search in October 2011 across five electronic databases: PubMed®, ISI Web of Knowledge, EMBASE, Scopus, and EconLit. The search used variations Vandetanib of two search terms:

“hepatitis A” and [one of six countries]. We included articles primarily focused on hepatitis A epidemiology, economics and/or policy. Epidemiologic articles included those reporting seroprevalence, incidence, prevalence, endemicity, clinical manifestations or risk factors of hepatitis A. Policy articles included government reports, editorials or reports without primary data, which were focused on issues related to vaccine adoption, prevention or control efforts for hepatitis A. We excluded articles less relevant to this analysis, such as papers focusing on biological mechanisms of hepatitis A, non-human studies, vaccine trial results, and case studies. Given that hepatitis A was not high on the global agenda prior to 1990, our search was limited to articles published since then. For most countries, pre-1990 seroprevalence data was reported in articles published after 1990 providing historical data with trends in seroprevalence over several decades. In some instances, however, it was necessary to search pre-1990 literature learn more to fill in data gaps on seroprevalence

prior to 1990. Articles in each of the local languages (Chinese, Korean, Russian, MycoClean Mycoplasma Removal Kit Spanish) were included in the search. Reference lists of primary studies and systematic reviews were also scanned to identify additional studies missed by the initial search. Articles were first reviewed for inclusion based on title. Abstracts and full articles were reviewed next to determine study inclusion. A supplementary internet search was conducted to fill in gaps in country-specific epidemiological data or vaccine policy information. Direct scan of ministry of health,

pediatric society, infectious disease society, immunization technical advisory councils, medical journal databases or other relevant websites was also conducted for each country to identify relevant articles or reports, find current recommendations or fill specific data gaps. For articles meeting the inclusion criteria, we abstracted data on background information (authors, title, year of publication and data collection, journal, country/region, type of article), as well as study design, study subject characteristics, results, policy recommendations and perceived barriers and facilitators to hepatitis A vaccine adoption. We summarized results separately for epidemiologic and policy-focused articles. Articles in Russian, Spanish, and Chinese were abstracted by native language speakers and writers of those languages, with a background in healthcare analysis.