Go for the gold! Get vaccinated

Vaccination week in the Americas will be celebrated during April 23 – 30, 2016. The theme for the week is ‘Go for the gold! Get vaccinated’.

Vaccines are an important public health intervention. When disease germs enter your body, they start to reproduce.Your immune system recognizes these germs as foreign invaders and responds by making proteins called antibodies. {{more}} These antibodies’ first job is to help destroy the germs that are making you sick. They can’t act fast enough to prevent you from becoming sick, but by eliminating the attacking germs, antibodies help you to get well.

The antibodies’ second job is to protect you from future infections. They remain in your bloodstream, and if the same germs ever try to infect you again, even after many years they will come to your defense. Only now that they are experienced at fighting these particular germs, they can destroy them before they have a chance to make you sick. This is called immunity. It is why most people get diseases like measles or chickenpox only once, even though they might be exposed many times during their lifetime.

Vaccines are made from the same germs (or parts of them) that cause disease; for example, polio vaccine is made from polio virus. But the germs in vaccines are either killed or weakened, so they won’t make you sick.

Vaccines containing these weakened or killed germs are introduced into your body, usually by injection. Your immune system reacts to the vaccine the same as it would if it were being invaded by the disease by making antibodies. The antibodies destroy the vaccine germs just as they would the disease germs like a training exercise. Then they stay in your body, giving you immunity. If you are ever exposed to the real disease, the antibodies are there to protect you.

We will discuss the importance of vaccination next week and also examine the vaccination schedule for SVG.

Dr Rosmond Adams is a medical doctor and a public health specialist.

He may be emailed at adamsrosmond@gmail.com