Mass vaccination programmes
In most countries, policy in public health medicine is to establish herd immunity to several diseases.
Some individuals may be not eligible for the vaccine (for example, those with a compromised immune system). These non-immune people are protected by the majority of the population being immunised.
Issues can arise with mass vaccination programmes, for example widespread vaccination may not be possible due to malnutrition and poverty levels in some countries.
Vaccines may also be rejected by a percentage of the population. This may be due to adverse publicity about the vaccine.
Immunisations can never be completely safe and there is always a risk of some side-effect. So, when making a decision, these are some of the factors that need to be considered:
- when fewer people are immunised, the number of cases of the disease increases
- the chance of falling seriously ill or dying from the disease may be far greater than the chance of experiencing a serious side-effect
- using a vaccine may be much cheaper than treating a very ill person