With all eyes on vaccines, World Immunization Week, April 24th – 30th 2021 offer an unprecedented opportunity to build public trust in the value of all vaccines and help build long-term support for immunization.
Vaccines have brought us closer, and will bring us closer again
For over 200 years, vaccines have protected us against diseases that threaten lives and prohibit our development. With their help, we can progress without the burden of diseases like smallpox and polio, which cost humanity hundreds of millions of lives.
While vaccines are not a silver bullet, they will again help us progress on a path to a world where we can be together again. Vaccines themselves continue to advance, bringing us closer to a world free from the likes of tuberculosis and cervical cancer, and ending suffering from childhood diseases like tetanus and measles.
Investment and new research is enabling groundbreaking approaches to vaccine development, which are changing the science of immunization forever, bringing us closer still to a healthier future.
A critical part of the solution to the pandemic, but not alone
Vaccines are a critical new tool in the battle against COVID-19. Working as quickly as they can, scientists from across the world are collaborating and innovating to bring us tests, treatments and vaccines that will collectively save lives and end this pandemic.
Safe and effective vaccines will be a game changer: but for the foreseeable future we must continue wearing masks, physically distancing and avoiding crowds.
Together, we can end the COVID-19 pandemic and achieve a healthier world for all.
When working with the public on vaccine education – below are key messages.
Message 1: Vaccines bring us closer to doing what we love with those we love.
- We have sacrificed so much to keep our loved ones and community safe from COVID-19: family reunions, hugs from loved ones, meals with friends and colleagues.
- Now, vaccines offer us the clearest path back to normal. Along with other measures like mask-wearing and physical distancing, equitably protecting people with safe and effective vaccines will help end the pandemic and bring us closer again.
- Thanks to decades of research and advances in vaccine science and technology during the pandemic, we will also be better prepared to handle diseases past, present and future.
Message 2: Vaccines bring us closer to a world where no one suffers or dies from a vaccine-preventable disease.
- Vaccines are one of the greatest scientific innovations of all time. In the past century, they have brought us closer to ending polio and helped us eradicate smallpox. Thanks to vaccines, today billions of people live healthy lives protected from vaccine-preventable diseases like measles and whooping cough.
- In just the last 30 years, child deaths have decreased by over 50%, thanks in large part to vaccines. Vaccines now help protect against more than 20 diseases, from pneumonia to cervical cancer and Ebola.
- Still, millions of children miss out on basic childhood vaccines every year. Increasing access to vaccines everywhere is the best way to give every child a healthy start to life and protect against preventable diseases from birth into old age.
Message 3: Vaccines bring us closer to a healthier, more prosperous world.
- In today’s interconnected world, an outbreak anywhere is a threat everywhere. Vaccines are one of the best tools we have to improve health and wellbeing around the world.
- Immunization helps children grow into healthy adults. Vaccinated, healthy children can attend school and reap the benefits of education, and their parents are able to participate in the workforce, putting communities on the path to greater economic prosperity.
- Immunization also reaches more people than any other health service, connecting families with health care systems and ensuring everyone has access to the care they need.
Click here for more information on World Immunization Week
Click here for Vaccine Safety Information on Vaccines.Gov
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