Childhood immunisation has been credited with being responsible for reducing childhood morbidity and mortality over the past 40-50 years. It was the first item on the list of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for the ‘Ten great public health achievements’ of the 20th century. The viral diseases smallpox and poliomyelitis were eradicated in the United States of America as a result of vaccina...

We describe a prospective study in which we investigated why children fail to get vaccinated against whooping cough, including an assessment of the attitudes of parents and professionals and the impact of different views of the contraindications. There was considerable disagreement among the professionals on the interpretation of the contraindications to immunisation, and the commonest reason f...

A 61-year-old woman visited our clinic to continue rabies post-exposure vaccination. She had sustained a dog bite on the right calf during a journey to South Asia seven days earlier. Immediately after the bite she received several injections on both upper arms, as well as around the bite site, at a local clinic. Active immunisation with Verorab 1 , intradermally applied at both deltoid areas on...

Vaccines are one of the greatest triumphs of healthcare innovation. They have saved millions of lives, prevented destructive chronic illnesses and eased pressures on health services across the globe. The UK NHS constitution states that everyone has the right to receive vaccinations recommended by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) under a NHS-provided national immunisati...

OBJECTIVE To determine whether collagen induced arthritis (CIA) in mice can be satisfactorily induced by a single immunisation and whether this model has some advantages compared with conventional CIA, which is induced by two immunisations. METHODS The incidence of arthritis was observed under different immunisation conditions (variation of species of Mycobacterium included in complete Freund...

OBJECTIVES To characterise cartilage intermediate layer protein (CILP)-induced arthropathy in mice. METHODS The first and second halves of the nucleotide triphosphate pyrophosphohydrolase (NTPPHase) non-homologous region of human CILP were prepared as recombinant proteins (C1 and C2, respectively), including three overlapping fragments of C2 (C2F1, C2F2, and C2F3). C57BL/6 mice were immunised...

Some vaccines show poor efficacy in tropical countries. Within a birth cohort in Uganda, we investigated factors that might influence responses to BCG and tetanus immunisation. Whole blood assay responses to crude culture filtrate proteins of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (cCFP)) and tetanus toxoid (TT) were examined among 1506 and 1433 one-year-olds, respectively. Maternal Mansonella perstans inf...

OBJECTIVES Children presenting unplanned to healthcare services are routinely asked about previous immunisations as part of their assessment. We aimed to assess the accuracy of screening children for immunisation status by history. DESIGN Diagnostic accuracy study. We compared information from patient history by a retrospective review of notes and used a central database of child immunisation...

There is growing evidence that the present policy of childhood immunisation in the United Kingdom is inadequate. It is unlikely ever to achieve complete eradication of the congenital rubella syndrome and measles, and the problem of mumps has not even begun to be addressed. After a coordinated campaign to increase uptake of immunisation in Fife the uptake of rubella immunisation in teenage girls...

BACKGROUND Tetanus is a deadly infectious disease for which immunisation is available in EPI at both infant level and for females of reproductive age. More than 95% of patients who develop tetanus have not been previously immunised. Objectives of the study were to determine the frequency of tetanus vaccination and to access the awareness of immunisation among females studying in 11 girls' colle...