This year’s European Immunisation Week (EIW) kicks off a ‘year of immunisation’, in which the World Health Organization (WHO) brings awareness to a concerning global decline in vaccination rates and the need for children in particular to catch-up on any missed doses. 2023 is the 75th anniversary of WHO, and here in the UK the NHS turns 75 in July and currently treats 1.3 million patients per day. Working together with the NHS, we help to deliver millions of vaccinations every year that save lives, prevent life changing injury, and allow people to get on with what they love best and also reduces the burden on the NHS. Routine vaccination at the right time delivers the best protection, helps to protect communities, families, and those too young or who are unable to be vaccinated. Encouraging conversations about vaccinations Understanding the importance of vaccination can save your life or the life of someone you love. Have a #VaccinationConversation with a healthcare professional to get the facts. We all benefit from a good conversation with a health professional, who can talk confidently about the vaccine, share the programme information with us in the accessible format that meets our needs when considering vaccination. In busy lives, it can be difficult to find the time to make an appointment, to have an opportunity to questions answered and to have them listen to concerns or worries we may have. Building confidence in and consenting to vaccination is a process. Conversations about vaccination between individuals and health professionals build trust and motivation to follow vaccine recommendations and schedules. Every dose counts, timing matters Every country’s national routine immunisation schedule is designed to ensure that each child is protected from potentially serious vaccine-preventable diseases when they need it most. National routine immunisation schedules are based on how children’s immune systems respond to vaccines at various ages and when they are most at risk for disease. To help get more families up to date with their routine vaccinations, we have recently:
produced translated versions of the UK schedule
revised the algorithm for those of uncertain status
revised the immunisation schedules comparison tool to include the schedule from February 2022 and recent changes to the vaccination programme
For most vaccine-preventable diseases, more than one dose of vaccine is needed to achieve and sustain optimal protection. Every dose in the immunisation schedule is timed to build or maintain protection. Missing or delaying any dose increases the risk of infection and serious illness. Many children in the WHO European Region are not up to date with their vaccinations as recommended in their countries’ vaccination schedules. Since the start of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, over 1.2 million children in the WHO European Region have missed a vaccination to protect them against measles, mumps, rubella (MMR). Measles is especially dangerous for young children, and cases are increasing in the WHO European Region. Materials and social media resources The ‘timing matters’ animation depicts a mother and her child as they make their way to a clinic to be vaccinated. On the way, the mother has to protect her child in time from the rain, from oncoming traffic, from losing a beloved toy. When she arrives at the clinic to vaccinate her child according to the schedule, she is doing one more timing-based action to protect the safety and happiness of her child. All materials in this package as well as additional materials including social media cards, factsheets and animations, launched for European Immunisation Week, can be accessed on Canto. These resources can be used to promote vaccination throughout 2023 and early 2024.