10 Effective Tips -DID YOU KNOW THIS ABOUT IMMUNIZATION AND THE COVID-19 VACCINE? | uxa2.com

Vaccination is considered one of the most cost-effective ways to prevent diseases. Unlike other methods, immunization has a wider coverage and can protect larger populations from disease-causing organisms. Most often, vaccination and immunization are used interchangeably.

According to the CDC, immunization is when a person protects themselves from an infection or disease through vaccination. The protection offered by vaccination is called immunity. Vaccination is also the process of introducing a vaccine or a weakened strain of an organism to produce immunity against a particular disease. Some of the vaccines available include hepatitis B vaccine, malaria vaccine, tetanus vaccine and the recently developed Covid-19 vaccine. According to Unicef, vaccinations are estimated to save approximately 2–3 million children from deadly diseases every year. Vaccines can be used in all age groups.

Immunization exercises for children in Ghana are popularly known as ‘weighing’. here, mothers are forced to send their babies to receive the vaccine periodically. For example, these babies receive five-in-one vaccines to help protect them against vaccine-preventable diseases such as whooping cough, tetanus, hepatitis B, diphtheria and Haemophilus influenzae. This exercise is mainly done in health centers, but sometimes the municipality’s health nurses are seen moving from house to house to vaccinate the children whose parents could not take them to the vaccination centers. Vaccinations have many benefits in addition to being one of the most effective means of preventing disease.

weight:700″>Vaccination helps save people’s lives and those around them.

When vaccinated, immunity is formed. In addition, the body forms a memory of organisms; this helps the body recognize these infections and fight them when it is exposed to the same infection in the future. Unfortunately, people easily catch infectious diseases, sometimes through close contact. Therefore, in order to protect the vulnerable groups in society, we must take vaccinations so that we do not infect those around us.

weight:700″>Vaccination helps protect the next generation.

Some diseases are passed from mother to child when they are not treated or prevented. According to the WHO, examples of such diseases are hepatitis B, rubella and HIV/AIDS. As part of the routine examinations performed during maternity care in our hospitals, pregnant women are screened for these vaccine-preventable diseases and, if necessary, the necessary measures are taken. With vaccines, we can prevent the spread or transmission of these diseases to future generations.

weight:700″>Vaccinations save money for ourselves and more money for the government.

Vaccination helps prevent the occurrence of some diseases. However, when a person gets sick or becomes disabled due to not being vaccinated, it puts a lot of burden on the individual and his family. Sometimes the family’s savings run out because it is necessary to get caregivers to help. In addition, there may be frequent visits to hospitals due to children’s regular exposure to infection, especially when they start attending school and also playing with other children. The government would have to spend a lot of public revenue to buy drugs to treat these diseases and support these vulnerable groups that could have been prevented by vaccines.

weight:700″>Vaccination helps reduce certain injuries in children.

When vaccination schedules are met on time, certain injuries associated with not receiving vaccines are significantly reduced – for example, some diseases such as polio. Blindness, deafness and other forms of mental disability in children have decreased during vaccination. According to Unicef, measles vaccines have prevented more than 23 million deaths between 2000 and 2018.

weight:700″>Some misconceptions about immunization

Although there have been good experiences with the use of vaccines in the world, there are still some myths associated with their use. For example, some people believe that vaccines are not safe, and because the covid-19 vaccine appeared quite quickly, some people doubt it. Vaccines, like other medicines, are tested and undergo clinical trials to make sure they are safe and effective. They are also licensed and approved for use by various regulatory authorities such as the FDA and ethics committees before being used in the human population; this makes them safer to use.

In addition, some wonder why people who have taken the vaccine still get infected with Covid-19. Some vaccines provide lifelong immunity, while others lose immunity after a few years. However, with the Covid-19 vaccine, it does not provide 100% immunity. Thanks to the built-up immunity, the infected person may experience milder symptoms even after vaccination. Therefore, it is necessary to take all the recommended vaccination doses to contain the spread of covid-19.

In addition, others believe that vaccines contain microchips that can be used to track the vaccinated. This is not true because one vial of vaccine can be used for more than one person and it is difficult to track many people. Instead, the information taken during vaccinations is used for monitoring in connection with allergic reactions related to vaccines and drug safety problems, i.e. to ensure that the vaccines are safe even after they have left the manufacturers.

In conclusion, immunization has helped the world to eradicate some diseases like smallpox and some diseases have not been recorded over the years because of vaccinations.

We should try to vaccinate when vaccines are available and get our children vaccinated.

1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2021.Vaccination: the basics retrieved from

2. Unicef. Vaccination in Ghana Retrieved from, evaluated on April 25, 2022.

4. World Health Organization., 2015. Myths and facts about immunization.