Worldwide vaccination could save 1.5 million children from death
exp. Dr. Nazlı Karakullukçu Çebi gave information about the ‘vaccine’ special for the Vaccination Week, which is celebrated every year in the last week of April. Expressing that the vaccine is a very important invention that has influenced the history of mankind, Uzm. Dr. Nazlı Karakullukçu Çebi pointed out that 2-3 million children die each year from vaccine-preventable diseases, but 1.5 million of these could be prevented with global vaccination.
“Free vaccination against 13 diseases is given in family health centers”
exp. Dr Çebi said: “In addition to protecting children from deadly diseases such as polio, tetanus and diphtheria, they also prevent the spread of diseases from child to child, reducing or eliminating them. The primary job of us doctors is not to treat disease, but to prevent it. Vaccines are the most important tool we have to serve this purpose. In our country, free vaccination against 13 diseases is provided in family health centers. This prevents the death of 14,296 children per year. For our children and the healthy future of our country, we must vaccinate our children.”
Underlining that despite the well-known benefits of vaccination in recent years, there has been a global decline in childhood vaccination rates. Dr Nazlı Karakullukçu Çebi said that according to 2017 data, the number of measles cases in Europe was about 3 times higher compared to the previous year and it was found that 87 percent of diagnosed cases refused to be vaccinated.
“General vaccination coverage has also fallen in Turkey”
Stressing that immunization rates with pertussis, tetanus and diphtheria vaccines fell to 92 percent in Europe and to 91 percent in the US, Uzm. Dr Çebi said: “It has been noted that general vaccination rates in Turkey have fallen. Immunization rates with measles, rubella, mumps, diphtheria, acellular pertussis, tetanus, pneumococcal conjugate and hepatitis B vaccines dropped from 98 percent in 2016 to 96 percent the following year. For this reason, the World Health Organization has included vaccine rejection among the 10 global problems it identified for 2019. In this context, it should be a social responsibility to prevent anti-vaccination.”