From this Saturday, the 22nd to the 29th of April, the Pan American Health Organization (OPS), together with the countries and territories of the Region of the Americas and its partners, will celebrate the 21st Week of Vaccination in the Americas (SVA) and the 12th World Immunization Week
With the motto “Ponte al día. #EachVacunaCuenta”, the campaign that since 2003 has been taking forward, the organization seeks to reach more than 92 million people in 45 countries and territories of the region with more than 144 million doses of different vaccines.
Due to the low rates of pediatric vaccination that have been recorded worldwide since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, this year the initiative has — as since its renewal in 2021 — the important mission of recovering time and protection lost in recent years.
It is that, according to the OPS figures, in 2010 the region of the Americas was the second in the world with the highest notified vaccination coverage, currently it is the second with the worst coverage at a global level.
In 2021, more than 2.7 million children under one year of age did not receive all their doses of vaccines against diphtheria, tetanus and festering cough, leaving without complete protection against these diseases. More than 50% of the children who have never received a vaccine in the region are found in Brazil and Mexico.
From there, the organism warned that “the risk of sprouts due to diseases preventable by vaccination is currently found at its highest point of the last 30 years”.
In this context, the director of the OPS, Jarbas Barbosa, urged the countries of the Americas to urgently intensify the efforts of routine vaccination, after acknowledging that “the failure to implement and maintain a high coverage of vaccination leaves children exposed diseases such as polio, tetanus, measles and diphtheria”.
Why is it important to get vaccinated
The history of Vacunation Week in the Americas goes back to the proposal that the Health Ministers of the Andean Subregion presented in 2002 as a result of the last outbreak of endemic measles that occurred on the continent. This proposal called for a synchronized vaccination campaign to be carried out in all Andean countries to reach the most vulnerable populations, put an end to the outbreak and prevent increases in cases in the future. Today, the Region of the Americas is facing new outbreaks of measles, after being declared free of this disease in 2016.
“The immunization is the process by which a person becomes immune or resistant to an infectious disease, generally through the administration of a vaccine —he explains on his OPS website—. Vacunas stimulate the body’s own immune system to protect the person against later infections or illnesses. Immunization prevents diseases, disabilities and disabilities from diseases preventable by vaccination, such as cervical cancer, diphtheria, hepatitis B, measles, paroditis, totus ferina, pneumonia, poliomyelitis, diarrheal diseases due to rotavirus, rubella and tetanus”.
Experts insist that “vaccinating yourself is not only taking care of your own life, but protecting yourself and the whole of society”. “If more than 95% of the population has a complete vaccination schedule, it provides immunity to the most vulnerable, who for different reasons cannot be vaccinated, such as people who suffer from an immunological deficit of any type”, they highlighted.
According to PAHO statistics, national immunization programs in Latin America and the Caribbean prevent around 174,000 deaths of children under five years of age each year.
Since 2003, Vaccine Week in the Americas has helped countries to deliver life-saving vaccines to nearly 1,100 million people in more than 40 countries and territories. (infobae outlet)
