About World Immunization Week
World Immunization Week, celebrated in the last week of April, aims to highlight the collective action needed and to promote the use of vaccines to protect people of all ages against disease.
If you and your children are up to date with your vaccinations, you are protected from the risk of serious illness due to communicable and vaccine-preventable diseases such as diphtheria, measles, polio, and whooping cough (pertussis). If you're not sure, you can check with your community health nurse or other care provider and review your recommended vaccines schedule together to determine which vaccinations you and your children may need to get.
Benefits of immunization
Immunization is one of the most successful and cost-effective health interventions and prevents between 2 and 3 million deaths every year. From infants to senior citizens, immunization prevents debilitating illness, disability and death from vaccine-preventable diseases such as diphtheria, hepatitis A and B, measles, mumps, pneumococcal disease, polio, rotavirus diarrhoea, tetanus and yellow fever. The benefits of immunization are increasingly being extended to adolescents and adults, providing protection against life-threatening diseases such as influenza, meningitis, and cancers (e.g. cervical and liver cancers) that occur in adulthood.
Ironically, the fact that immunization has made many infectious diseases rare or almost unheard of can lead to the opinion among parents and health professionals that immunization is no longer necessary. Due to gaps in vaccination coverage, diseases like diphtheria, measles and polio are making a comeback. Disease outbreaks affect everyone.
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