Know about vaccines to prevent infections: Dr Hari Kishan Boorugu

Dr Hari Kishan Boorugu, Senior Consultant Physician, Apollo Hospital, Hyderguda, delivered the 248th Public Garden Walkers' Association (PGWA) monthly Health Lecture, on ‘Prevent Infections - Know your Vaccines', on Sunday at Public Gardens, Hyderabad. Members of PGWA including Ghulam Yazdani, Chairman; Pramod Kumar Kedia, Vice President; Purshottam Das, Gen. Secretary; Vishwanath Agarwal, Jt Secretary; Sohanlal Kadel, Jt Secretary; BL Pershad Jaiswal, Treasurer; Prof Mohd. Masood Ahmed, Health Care Advisor and Patrons B Sreekanth Reddy and G Ekember Reddy, Morning walkers and general public were present on the occasion.

Elaborating on the topic Dr Hari Kishan Boorugu said, vaccines are drugs which are helpful in boosting immunity against a particular infection. In India, childhood vaccination programme is a huge success and many children are protected from infections. However knowledge among people about adult vaccination is very poor and we need to create awareness among adults so that they can benefit from the vaccines.

This has particular significance because even when someone gets vaccinated in childhood, the effect of some vaccines wane off as we grow older and we need to take some vaccines repeatedly. There are some vaccines which are recommended only for adults. Dr Boorugu said, some vaccines are recommended for all but some are recommended only for certain high risk individuals and few other vaccines are only for adults with poor immunity and some are recommended for people at high risk of acquiring that particular infection.

He cited the example of people working with dogs being recommended to take Rabies vaccine as they are at risk of getting bitten by dogs – Rabies is a deadly disease that can be transmitted by a dog bite. Adult vaccine recommendations also vary from country to country as different, he added.

Tetanus
Booster of Td vaccine every 10 years for all adults
Hepatitis B
3 doses at 0,1,6 months for all seronegative adults, health care workers & travellers in endemic areas
Hepatitis A
2 does are given 6 months apart to people with chronic liver disease, travellers to highly endemic areas adults & adolescents living in areas of high endemicity
Typhoid
Single dose of 0.5ml to serongative travellers to highly endemic areas, to be repeated in 3 years.
Influenza
Annual vaccination for persons >65 years of age, people with cardiopulmonary diseases, health care workers & household contacts.
Chickenpox
One dose of Chickenpox vaccine to those adults who have no prior history of disease or immunization against Chickenpox.
Pneumococcol
5 yearly vaccination to persons >65 years of age, people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, splenectomy, CHF and health workers
Antirabies
Pre exposure vaccination at 0, 7 & 28 days to veterinarians, animal handlers & wild life officers etc. Post exposure vaccination on contact with suspected or confirmed rabid animal given on 0,3,7,14&28 days.