Why vaccines are important

Why vaccines are important ?  

Vaccination is the most important thing you can do to protect yourself and your children against ill health. They prevent up to three million deaths worldwide every year.

If people stop having vaccines, it's possible for infectious diseases to quickly spread again.

How vaccines work ? 

Vaccines teach your immune system how to create antibodies that protect you from diseases.

It's much safer for your immune system to learn this through vaccination than by catching the diseases and treating them.

Once a vaccine has taught your immune system how to fight a disease, it can often protect you for many years.

Having a vaccine also benefits your whole community through "herd immunity".

If enough people are vaccinated, it's harder for the disease to spread to those people who cannot have vaccines. For example, people who are ill or have a weakened immune system.

By making sure your own vaccinations are up-to-date, you can help protect loved ones who may be vulnerable to infectious diseases.

Vaccine safety

All vaccines go through extensive trials and testing to make sure they will not harm you or your child. A vaccine can only be approved once it has completed testing and is found to be safe.

Side effects of vaccination

Some vaccines can cause side effects. For most people these are mild and do not last long.

The most common side effects of vaccination include:

• the area where the needle goes in looking red, swollen and feeling a bit sore for several days

• babies or young children feeling a bit unwell or developing a high temperature for one or two days

Some children might also cry and be upset immediately after the injection. This is a normal response.

Allergic reactions

It's rare for anyone to have a serious allergic reaction to a vaccination. If this does happen, it usually happens within minutes.

The person who vaccinates you or your child will be trained to recognise allergic reactions and treat them immediately. With prompt treatment, you or your child will make a good recovery.

Vaccine ingredients

Most people are not concerned about vaccine ingredients and know that they are safe.

The main ingredient of any vaccine is a small amount of bacteria, virus or toxin that's been weakened or destroyed in a laboratory first.

This means there's no risk of healthy people catching a disease from a vaccine.

Vaccines do sometimes contain other ingredients. These ingredients can include;

• aluminum
• squalene oil
• pork gelatine
• egg protein
• formaldehyde
• antibiotics

These help to make the vaccine safer and more effective and there is no evidence the ingredients are harmful in the small quantities used in vaccines.

 Why do we need to get vaccinated?

 We need to get vaccinated in order to strengthen immunity prevent serious infectious diseases Especially for children, the elderly, and people with chronic diseases. This is because vaccination will help reduce the spread and reduce the serious impact of the disease on patients. Our body will build immunity against that disease.