[Sensorineural hearing loss in childhood: evaluation of economic impact in view of vaccine prevention of cases due to congenital cytomegalovirus infection].

Sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) is a serious public health problem which affects 1-3% per hundred live born babies in developed countries. The congenital cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is its most important non-genetic cause. The evaluation of the effectiveness of future programs of anti-CMV vaccination requires an assessment of the present costs of SNHL. Direct costs for the Italian public system were calculated per prosthesis child until his full age and turned out to add up to 260,000 euro. Private costs are difficult to be assessed and anyhow are highly dependent from the socio-economic level. This preliminary assessment suggests that the vaccination would be cost-saving if SNHL cases due to congenital CMV were more than 21 per year, corresponding to a congenital infection prevalence higher than 0.21%o.