(Geneva) Vaccines have saved at least 154 million human lives over the last 50 years, the equivalent of six people every minute, according to a WHO study published Wednesday by the scientific journal The Lancet.
The World Health Organization emphasizes, in a press release, that this estimate is “conservative” because the study only concerns vaccination against 14 diseases, including diphtheria, hepatitis B, measles, whooping cough, tetanus or yellow fever.
“Vaccines are among the most powerful inventions in history,” said WHO Director-General Dr.r Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in the press release.
“Thanks to vaccination, never before have so many children been able to survive and develop beyond their fifth birthday,” commented the Executive Director of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Catherine Russell, in the same press release.
WHO, UNICEF, vaccine alliance Gavi and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation unveiled the joint Human Possible campaign to support vaccination efforts.
These efforts sometimes come up against very strong anti-vaccine sentiments, fueled by conspiracy theories circulating on social networks.
The study shows that the majority of lives saved through vaccination, 101 million, are those of infants. Vaccination against the 14 diseases has directly contributed to reducing child mortality by 40% worldwide and by more than 50% in Africa.
“Thanks to vaccines, smallpox has been eradicated, polio is on the verge of being eradicated, and with the more recent development of vaccines against diseases like malaria and cervical cancer, we are pushing back the borders of the disease”, underlined the Dr Tedros.
Among the vaccines examined in the study, the one intended to combat measles had the most significant impact, accounting for 60% of lives saved.
And thanks to polio vaccination, more than 20 million people who might have been paralyzed can now walk.
Progress under threat
This progress highlights the importance of protecting vaccination advances in all countries around the world, says the WHO.
But “we cannot take these advances for granted” while “the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted routine vaccination programs around the world,” said Dr.r Tedros at a press conference.
“In many countries, the debt crisis is forcing governments to cut funding for essential health programs. Climate change and conflict make the provision of routine health services more difficult,” Violaine Mitchell, of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, underlined by videoconference.
WHO calls for intensified efforts to reach the 67 million children who have not received one or more vaccines during the pandemic.
The UN agency is particularly concerned about measles.
Nearly 94 million of the 154 million lives saved since 1974 have been thanks to vaccines against this disease, of which two doses are necessary. But 33 million children still missed a dose of measles vaccine in 2022.
Vaccination coverage of 95% or more, with two doses of measles vaccine, is needed to protect communities from outbreaks. Currently, this global rate for the first dose is 83% and for the second dose 74%, contributing to “a very high number of outbreaks” across the world, according to the WHO.
“Misinformation about the measles vaccine certainly plays a role in people’s decisions whether or not to get vaccinated. And we are really concerned about the way that this misinformation and the anti-vax movements are growing in terms of their ability to communicate and spread misinformation,” WHO director of immunization and vaccines told reporters. Dr Kate O’Brien.
“But the main reason why children are not vaccinated against measles is linked to the possibility of having access to vaccines, to the ability of programs to go to all places in the world,” she stressed. .
reference: www.lapresse.ca