Vaccine preventable diseases and vaccination coverage in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, Australia 2006-2010.

This report outlines the major positive impacts of vaccines on the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people from 2007 to 2010, as well as highlighting areas that require further attention. Hepatitis A disease is now less common in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children than in their non-Indigenous counterparts. Hepatitis A vaccination for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children was introduced in 2005 in the high incidence jurisdictions of the Northern Territory, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. In 2002–2005, there were 20 hospitalisations for hepatitis A in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children aged<5 years--over 100 times more common than in other children--compared to none in 2006/07–2009/10. With respect to invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD), there has been a reduction of 87% in notifications of IPD caused by serotypes contained in 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (7vPCV) since the introduction of the childhood 7vPCV program among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. However, due to a lower proportion of IPD caused by 7vPCV types prior to vaccine introduction, the decline in total IPD notifications has been less marked in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children than in other children. Higher valency vaccines (10vPCV and 13vPCV) which replaced 7vPCV from 2011 are likely to result in a greater impact on IPD and potentially also non-invasive disease, although disease caused by non-vaccine...
Source: Communicable Diseases Intelligence Quarterly Report - Category: Infectious Diseases Tags: Commun Dis Intell Q Rep Source Type: research