While most of us pay more attention towards eating better, exercising and washing hands regularly, forgetting about one of the simplest preventive care measures that is Vaccination or Immunization. Vaccines play an important role in protecting adults against serious and sometimes deadly diseases. As a child, you may have been vaccinated against diseases such as polio, tetanus, and measles but can you remember the last time you were vaccinated as an adult?
As you grow older, you may be at risk for vaccine-preventable diseases because of your age, lifestyle, job, travel, or chronic health condition. You will be shocked to know adult immunization coverage is less than 10% in India mostly due to low awareness. Millions of adults die every year from vaccine-preventable diseases. It is very sad and unfortunate that we have been unable to the available technology to reduce the incidence to infectious disease and have failed to fill the gap between the number of cases that could be prevented and the number that actually we face.
Child vaccination is the first priority for the government of India, well it should be, there is no doubt about it but adult immunization is the ignored part of health care services. Adult immunization should be reviewed every 3 years to incorporate new strategies from any emerging research from India. There is an immediate need to address the problem of adult immunization in India. Although many issues revolving around efficacy, safety, and cost of introducing vaccines for adults at the national level are yet to be resolved, there is an urgent need to sensitize the health planners as well as health care providers regarding this pertinent issue.
Take for an example the recent swine flu epidemic, proper vaccination before the epidemic would have reduced the mortality rate by a huge margin. According to an article published in a famous newspaper, Indian doctors are themselves not much aware about adult immunization. In fact, most of them are themselves not immunized despite being vulnerable as they are in such close contact with people carrying infections. The importance of immunization can be understood by the fact that several countries refuse to give citizenship to people who are not properly vaccinated.
Let’s take you through some quick facts about Adult Vaccination:
- Adult vaccination saves up to 3 million lives every year
- Adult vaccination reduces mortality, morbidity, reduces direct and indirect medical costs
- Flu vaccine shots taken by adults has led to a 70% decline in hospitalizations
- Hepatitis B vaccines have caused a drop in the incidence of liver cancer
Vaccines you need:
All adults should get annual flu vaccine & Td/Tdap.
Other Vaccines that you may require are Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, Human Papillomavirus (HPV), Meningococcal, Pneumococcal, Shingles, more if traveling overseas, depending on the destination.
Take steps to protect yourself and your loved ones:
- Get information about vaccines recommended for adults based on age and other factors.
- Talk with your doctor about which vaccines are right for you.
- Get vaccinated and keep track of your vaccinations and make sure you stay up-to-date.
- Encourage your friends and loved ones to get vaccinated.
Vaccines are completely safe, make sure they are part of routine healthcare as not all vaccines are costly, and if we consider total cost of hospitalization due to disease burden, it's definitely worth investing on immunization.
Stay Healthy, Stay Safe!