Immunizations - General Overview
Alternate Names : Vaccinations
Definition
Immunization (vaccination) is a way to trigger your immune system and prevent serious, life-threatening diseases.
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Description
Our bodies are designed to protect us from diseases. When someone is exposed to an illness, the immune system actually learns from the experience. The next time it is exposed to the same illness, the body often recognizes the culprit and sets out to destroy it.
Immunization exposes people to a very small, very safe amount of the most important diseases they are likely to encounter at some point in their lives. This mild exposure helps their immune systems recognize and attack the disease efficiently. If people are exposed to the full-blown diseases later in life, they will either not become infected or have much less serious infections. This is a natural way to deal with infectious diseases.
Throughout human history, infectious diseases have caused measureless misery and death. This rampage was unchecked until the twentieth century, when immunization was introduced on a wide scale. This led to the global eradication of smallpox, the elimination of polio from the Americas, and has almost eliminated tetanus, diphtheria, mumps, and the horrible congenital rubella syndrome. Immunization has greatly reduced the occurrence of measles, pertussis, and meningitis. Millions of deaths and other tragedies have been prevented.
Four different types of vaccines are currently available.
- Attenuated (weakened) live virus is used in the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and the varicella (chicken pox) vaccine. These vaccines last longer than other vaccines, but may cause serious infections in people with compromised immune systems.
- Killed (inactivated) viruses or bacteria used in some vaccines. For example, the influenza vaccine uses killed virus. These vaccines are safe, even in people with compromised immune systems.
- Toxoid vaccines contain a toxin produced by the bacterium or virus. For example, the diphtheria and tetanus vaccines are actually toxoids.
- Biosynthetic vaccines contain synthetic "man-made" substances which appear to be antigens to the immune system. For example, the Hib (Haemophilus influenzae type B) conjugate vaccine is a biosynthetic vaccine.
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