Blog archive

In its 2019 new year message, WHO has named vaccine hesitancy as one of the world’s top 10 global health threats, alongside air pollution and climate change, noncommunicable diseases, global influenza pandemic, fragile and vulnerable settings, antimicrobial resistance,  Ebola and other high-threat …more

Cervical cancer is on the rise among young women in Japan. This contrasts with the trend seen in most other developed countries, where rates have been falling, largely as a result of screening and vaccination against human papillomavirus (HPV) — the chief cause …more

2018 has been a year of anniversaries – particularly the devastating “Spanish” influenza pandemic, which peaked in 1918, and the armistice ending the First World War. But it also marked 200 years since the 1818 publication of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein; …more

The Lancet  COMMENT| VOLUME 392, ISSUE 10161.   On Oct 17, 2018, WHO reported 52958 measles cases in the European region since the beginning of 2018, which is more than double the 23 757 cases reported for Africa in the same …more

A new Lancet editorial on the “Decade of Vaccines”, takes a long term view and recognizes that, ” in the current social and political climate, perhaps it is time to re-evaluate.” In addition to acknowledging advances, it takes a sobering …more

A new BBC investigation into fake news in Africa and India shows the viral power of misinformation on public sentiment  and behaviours. These dynamics are equally dangerous in their power to undermine vaccine confidence and trigger vaccine refusal and the …more

High confidence in vaccination programmes is crucial for maintaining high coverage rates, especially at levels that exceed those required for herd immunity. Across the European Union (EU), however, vaccine delays and refusals are contributing to declining immunisation rates in a …more

published in Nature 562, 309 (2018) A century after the world’s worst flu epidemic, rapid spread of misinformation is undermining trust in vaccines crucial to public health. A hundred years ago this month, the death rate from the 1918 influenza was at …more

  The Philippines’ highly politicised response to newly-reported risks of a dengue vaccine led to a dramatic drop in public trust in vaccines overall, in  new research published in Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics. Led by the Vaccine Confidence Project at …more

Thanks to Naveen Thacker for this timely commentary: I have been a paediatrician for over three decades and have had parents come to me with many questions about their children’s health. But over the last year I have seen a …more