© 2024 KRCU Public Radio
90.9 Cape Girardeau | 88.9-HD Ste. Genevieve | 88.7 Poplar Bluff
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
With some questionable health advice being posted by your friends on Facebook, politicians arguing about the state of the American healthcare system and a new medical study being summarized in just a sentence or two on TV---that seems to contradict the study you heard summarized yesterday---it can be overwhelming to navigate the ever-changing landscape of health news.

World Immunization Week

In the late 1940s to the early 1950s, polio outbreaks in the United States increased in frequency and size; polio disabled an average of more than 35,000 people in the United States each year. It was one of the most feared diseases of the twentieth century. Thanks to effectiveness of the vaccine, the United States has been polio-free since 1979.

This is World Immunization Week.

The World Health Organization aims to promote the use of vaccines to protect people of all ages against disease. Immunization saves millions of lives and is widely recognized as one of the world’s most successful and cost-effective health interventions.

This will be the second year of the Close the Immunization Gap campaign, which celebrates the enormous successes to date in reaching children all over the world with life-saving vaccines. The campaign seeks to draw the world’s attention to the critical importance of reaching vulnerable people living in conflict situations. The 2016 campaign additionally stresses the need for immunization among adolescents and adults - throughout life.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “immunization prevents between 2 and 3 million deaths every year. Without vaccines, global eradication of smallpox and elimination of polio and measles from large parts of the world would have been impossible.” The CDC  urges people around the world to find out what vaccines they should have, check their vaccination status, and get the vaccines they need.

Websites:
http://www.who.int/campaigns/immunization-week/2016/event/en/
http://www.cdc.gov/features/worldimmunizationweek/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erHXKP386Nk
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/easy-to-read/child-easyread.html
 

Dr. Brooke Hildebrand Clubbs is an assistant professor in the Department of Leadership, Middle & Secondary Education. She writes for special publications of The Southeast Missourian and is a certified Community Health Worker.
Related Content