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The world was never so close to reach the polio eradication: only 37 cases notified in 2016 in only three countries, but the game is not yet at the end. The risk of polio outbreaks in the EU is smaller than it has ever been in the past, but it is not so small that we can ignore it. The EU MS must remain alert and plan and prepare for managing polio events or outbreaks because of the possible dire...
Despite wide vaccination coverage with efficacious vaccines, pertussis is still not under control in any country. Two types of vaccines are available for the primary vaccination series, diphtheria/tetanus/whole-cell pertussis and diphtheria/tetanus/acellular pertussis vaccines, in addition to reduced antigen content vaccines recommended for booster vaccination. Using these vaccines, several strategies...
At the current time, the field of vaccinology remains empirical in many respects. Vaccine development, vaccine immunogenicity, and vaccine efficacy have, for the most part, historically been driven by an empiric “isolate-inactivate-inject” paradigm. In turn, a population-level public health paradigm of “the same dose for everyone for every disease” model has been the normative thinking in regard to...
The clinical relevance of herpes zoster (HZ) and its increased incidence in recent years has prompted a search for more effective measures of prevention and therapy. A number of vaccines has been developed. For two of them, the live attenuated HZ vaccine (LAHZV) and the adjuvanted recombinant subunit HZ vaccine (SUHZV), data regarding immunogenicity, efficacy, safety and reactogenicity have been collected...
Measles, mumps, rubella and varicella are viral infections which can implicate seriously long-term sequelae of infected individuals or even the unborn child. Vaccines against the individual diseases have long been available. Global measles vaccination is estimated to have prevented more than 20million deaths during 2000–2015. During the same time period, measles incidence decreased from 146 to 36...
The prevention of paediatric bacterial meningitis and septicaemia has recently entered a new era with the availability of two vaccines against capsular group B meningococcus (MenB). Both of these vaccines are based on sub-capsular proteins of the meningococcus, an approach that overcomes the challenges set by the poorly immunogenic MenB polysaccharide capsule but adds complexity to predicting and...
Despite availability of safe and cost-effective vaccines to prevent it, measles remains one of the significant causes of death among children under five years of age globally. The World Health Organization (WHO) European Region has seen a drastic decline in measles and rubella cases in recent years, and a few of the once common measles genotypes are no longer detected. Buoyed by this success, all...
Adult immunization coverage rates remain low in the United States and internationally, despite obvious benefits to vaccinating and maintaining a well-vaccinated adult population. Broad policy changes are required to identify and address gaps in financing, in immunization infrastructure, and patient and provider awareness and knowledge to improve the protection of our adult and aging population from...
At the beginning of this century, a number of studies suggested that in healthy children, particularly those <2years of age, influenza could have a serious and complicated course, as it frequently led to hospitalization and sometimes, albeit rarely, to death. Moreover, pre-schoolers and school-age children were found to be among the most important causes of influenza transmission to the community,...
We have just witnessed the largest and most devastating outbreak of Ebola virus disease, which highlighted the urgent need for development of an efficacious vaccine that could be used to curtail future outbreaks. Prior to 2014, there had been limited impetus worldwide to develop a vaccine since the virus was first discovered in 1976. Though too many lives were lost during this outbreak, it resulted...
Noroviruses (NoVs) are one of the leading causes of acute gastroenteritis, including both outbreaks and endemic infections. The development of preventive strategies, including vaccines, for the most susceptible groups (children <5years of age, the elderly and individuals suffering crowding, such as military personnel and travelers) is desirable. However, NoV vaccine development has faced many difficulties,...
Rotavirus (RV) is the leading cause of severe acute gastroenteritis (GE) in infants worldwide. Several vaccines against RV were developed to reduce disease burden, hospitalization rates and health utilization costs. RV GE is a serious disease in preterm (PT) infants, and the administration of RV vaccine to these at-risk subjects at the proper time could have great clinical relevance. However, most...
Adult immunization is a priority for public health, particularly in countries where an aging population has become increasingly more numerous. Protection against diseases which typically affect adults (like flu, pneumococcal diseases and Herpes zoster), the shift of age of infections which originally affected children (like measles), the decreasing protection with time for infections which need periodical...
Prophylactic human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine represents a revolutionary step forward in preventing HPV-related cancers, especially cervical carcinoma. Alongside appropriate screening, it has the potential to dramatically reduce cervical cancer incidence and even eradicate it. Following extensive evaluations in clinical trials, the first decade of routine HPV vaccine use provides overwhelming evidence...
Vaccination during pregnancy is increasingly being recognised internationally a useful means of preventing illness in pregnant women and their newborns. It has been used since the 1960s, when it was found that tetanus vaccine was highly effective in preventing neonatal tetanus, but interest has greatly increased over the last few years. As new data become available showing the numerous benefits of...
With the increase in the number of routine vaccinations the development of pentavalent and hexavalent combination vaccines fitting the routine vaccination schedules became a necessity. In this respect, Europe has taken the lead in comparison with other world regions, and routine vaccination with pentavalent and hexavalent combinations including DTPa, Hib, HepB and IPV has been on European vaccination...
Vaccines stimulate a person’s immune system to produce an adequate reaction against a specific infectious agent; i.e. the person is protected from that disease without having to get it first. As vaccines are administrated to healthy subjects, they are held to the highest standards of safety. Regarding human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines, at present three prophylactic vaccines are licensed (bivalent...
In 2013, the annual influenza immunisation programme in England was extended to children to reduce the burden of influenza, but uptake was sub-optimal at 53.2%.To explore the reasons some parents decided not to vaccinate their child against influenza as part of the pilot programme offered in schools.Cross-sectional qualitative study conducted between February and July 2015. 913 parents whose children...
The challenge of assimilating millions of immigrants in the European region each year presents significant socioeconomic issues. Among them is the threat of vaccine preventable diseases (VPDs) disease transmission within immigrant groups and the broader population given the permeability of nation state borders. A total of 3.8 million people immigrated to the European Union (EU) in 2014, among those...
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