Data from the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) show that 1.6 million children in Brazil, from 2019 to 2021, did not receive any dose of the DTP vaccine, which protects against diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough. The number is repeated in the case of the vaccine against poliomyelitis, popularly known as infantile paralysis: 1.6 million children were not immunized in that same period. 
To be considered immunized, the child needs to take all recommended doses of immunization. In the case of DTP, the regimen consists of three doses, at 2 months, 4 months and 6 months. In Brazil, in addition to 1.6 million children who did not take any dose, 700,000 only took the first and/or second, but did not take the third, which leads to a total of 2.4 million children not immunized .
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Unicef warns that the planet is experiencing the biggest continuous setback in child immunization in 30 years, fueled by the covid-19 pandemic, and calls for urgency in resuming global vaccine coverage. Currently, Brazil has one of the lowest vaccination coverage since the creation of the National Immunization Program (PNI), not reaching 60% of vaccinated children, against 95% in previous years.
“The Brazilian numbers are part of an urgent global challenge”, evaluated the entity.
Confidence in vaccines
The report State of the World’s Children 2023: For every child, immunization, released by the fund, shows that the perception of the importance and confidence in vaccines for children has decreased in 52 of the 55 countries surveyed. In Brazil, although the rates remain high, there was a drop of 10 percentage points – before the pandemic, 99.1% of Brazilians trusted childhood vaccines, against 88.8% now.
“Different from the global results, in Brazil the drop in confidence was more pronounced among older men (over 65 years old). In most of the countries surveyed, the drop was greater among women and people under 35 years of age,” said UNICEF.
Active screening and routine immunization
Given the Brazilian data, UNICEF assesses that the country, in the short and medium term, needs to invest to expand the percentage of vaccine coverage in all states and municipalities, in a joint effort at the federal, state and municipal levels so that all cities return to the level of more than 95% of routine immunization coverage, recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO).
“At the same time, it is urgent to find and vaccinate each of the 1.6 million children who were left behind and did not receive any polio or DTP vaccines between 2019 and 2021; and those who missed other vaccines on the calendar or are overdue for doses”, added the entity, citing the active search and resumption of vaccination campaigns and communication strategies aimed at families and health professionals.
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