The World Health Organization has been celebrating the last week of April as World Vaccination Week since 2003.
This year, due to Vaccination Week, the importance of getting vaccinated is tried to be explained.
Experts say the vaccine is the biggest discovery in the history of the world.
President of the Infectious Diseases Association, Prof. Dr. Mehmet Ceyhan said that every year, 3 million children's lives are saved in the world with vaccination.
“If we can develop this further, if we can vaccinate more children, then we have a chance to save 2 million more children.”
“It is not possible to compare the vaccine with any other subject”
Ceyhan mentioned that the vaccine is the development that makes the most positive contribution to human health and life in the world, and therefore it is important.
“According to our calculations for Turkey, 14,296 children are saved from death every year with the vaccination we currently apply. The vaccine, which we call the pneumonia vaccine among the people, has been added. The death of 2,500 children was prevented. That's why the vaccine is extremely important and it's certainly not comparable to any other subject.”
According to the information given by Ceyhan, the cost of preventing a death with a vaccine is approximately 1 dollar.
“It costs $10 to prevent death by quitting smoking. When we compare the price of saving lives with the vaccine in the world, it is not possible to find a cheaper method than the vaccine. Extremely effective. Do not think that the vaccine only prevents infectious diseases. Vaccination is also the most effective method for preventing cancer, for example, as most diseases also cause other diseases. Therefore, vaccination is an inexpensive, effective and widespread practice all over the world.”
prof. Dr. Ceyhan also points out that there has been an increase in anti-vaccination in Turkey recently.
“This was an event that we did not care much about in terms of numbers before. The number of families who do not want their children to be vaccinated has increased from 180 in 2011. It increased to 12 thousand in 2016 and 23 thousand in 2017. As such, vaccination rates in Turkey dropped from 98 percent to 96 percent all of a sudden. 98 percent was a very good figure for Türkiye. Türkiye was the country with the highest vaccination rate in Europe.”
“Infectious diseases are seen with the reduction of vaccination”
prof. Dr. Ceyhan says that with the reduction of vaccination, the most contagious diseases will be seen first, and then all patients who are prevented by vaccination will begin to be seen.
“We haven't seen polio for many years, about 20 years. We have not seen a case of diphtheria for nearly 20 years, apart from what we have seen in an unvaccinated case. We don't see neonatal tetanus. We eliminated cases of congenital rubella. We're going to start seeing all of these. It started with measles because it is the most contagious. While there were 12 cases in 2016, 85 cases were seen in 2017. Since the beginning of the year, nearly 70 cases have been seen. Among them are children who have been vaccinated. We always say this; Not vaccinating not only puts your child at risk, it also puts the vaccinated child at risk. Because no vaccine alone provides 100 percent protection. However, if you are vaccinated at a high rate, that 1-2 percent, the chance of the child who is not protected despite the vaccine to encounter someone with the disease disappears. As soon as you start to reduce these rates to 90 percent, we will start to see cases, including those who are vaccinated, as patients and those who are not protected despite vaccination will face each other. It's not just measles, of course. If it continues to decline like this, other diseases will begin to appear.”
With the efforts of the Ministry of Health, studies have been started to produce a vaccine. Ceyhan emphasized that thanks to this, the vaccine has become a more important issue again.
“It is necessary to consider that every news made against the vaccine affects public health deeply and not only that some people do not have their children vaccinated, but also that people who have vaccinated will put their children at risk. When discussing vaccine issues in front of the public, it should either be discussed very correctly or not brought up in the wrong way.”
Source: AA
