What purpose does hepatitis vaccination really serve?
Wednesday, 21 April 2010
Fauzia Zebun
A Hepatitis Study Group in Bangladesh ran an advertisement last year, purportedly to create awareness about the prevalence of various liver diseases in the country. The thrust, as usual, was predominantly on selling costly vaccines on one pretext or the orther. The Association for the Study of the Liver must be credited, however for including some down-to-earth information, such as the importance of hygiene, and the safety of food and water, in the prevention of hepatitis A and E. Thanks to them for mentioning these simple but vital points.
Blood and body-fluid-borne B and C varieties on the other hand are both transmitted through the same routes as AIDS, that is, through unprotected carnal activity and use of contaminated syringes and exposure to infected body fluids. Claiming that one in 12 persons worldwide suffers from some kind of hepatitis, the ad says that all age groups should go for vaccination against type B, while children should additionally be inoculated against type A. As for type C hepatitis, against which a vaccine is yet to be designed, caution is the only prevention, said the study group. But is hepatitis vaccination at all necessary ? Whose purpose does the programme serve?
People have been asking these questions ever since the programme started a decade or so ago with the allegedly 'controversial trial of hepatitis B vaccine' through some schools in Bangladesh. Towards the beginning of the programme, a symposium on liver diseases was organized in Dhaka and experts then said that 7.5 per cent of the population in this country carried the hepatitis B virus and that 20,000 of them died of it every year. The study group considered this prevalence serious enough to merit countrywide immunization. But surely liver diseases could hardly be treated in the same way as the cluster of child killers that continue to engage the global health authorities for universal immunization ? Isn't it better to go for preventive measures through information, education and communication about the role of safe water, safe food and proper sanitation ? After all, most terminal cirrhosis of the liver in this region are due to poor- quality diet, particularly aflatoxin- spoilt grain. In any case these questionable vaccines do not provide lifetime immunity.
In poverty-ridden Bangladesh the purpose of the mushrooming 'vaccination points' is to make money while researching on Bangladesh's uninformed people. We have actually become a goldmine for microbiological research. There are plenty of human guinea pigs available, and thanks to the apathy of the scientific community, we serve the commercial interests of giant companies by sticking our necks out for their R&D wings!
A Hepatitis Study Group in Bangladesh ran an advertisement last year, purportedly to create awareness about the prevalence of various liver diseases in the country. The thrust, as usual, was predominantly on selling costly vaccines on one pretext or the orther. The Association for the Study of the Liver must be credited, however for including some down-to-earth information, such as the importance of hygiene, and the safety of food and water, in the prevention of hepatitis A and E. Thanks to them for mentioning these simple but vital points.
Blood and body-fluid-borne B and C varieties on the other hand are both transmitted through the same routes as AIDS, that is, through unprotected carnal activity and use of contaminated syringes and exposure to infected body fluids. Claiming that one in 12 persons worldwide suffers from some kind of hepatitis, the ad says that all age groups should go for vaccination against type B, while children should additionally be inoculated against type A. As for type C hepatitis, against which a vaccine is yet to be designed, caution is the only prevention, said the study group. But is hepatitis vaccination at all necessary ? Whose purpose does the programme serve?
People have been asking these questions ever since the programme started a decade or so ago with the allegedly 'controversial trial of hepatitis B vaccine' through some schools in Bangladesh. Towards the beginning of the programme, a symposium on liver diseases was organized in Dhaka and experts then said that 7.5 per cent of the population in this country carried the hepatitis B virus and that 20,000 of them died of it every year. The study group considered this prevalence serious enough to merit countrywide immunization. But surely liver diseases could hardly be treated in the same way as the cluster of child killers that continue to engage the global health authorities for universal immunization ? Isn't it better to go for preventive measures through information, education and communication about the role of safe water, safe food and proper sanitation ? After all, most terminal cirrhosis of the liver in this region are due to poor- quality diet, particularly aflatoxin- spoilt grain. In any case these questionable vaccines do not provide lifetime immunity.
In poverty-ridden Bangladesh the purpose of the mushrooming 'vaccination points' is to make money while researching on Bangladesh's uninformed people. We have actually become a goldmine for microbiological research. There are plenty of human guinea pigs available, and thanks to the apathy of the scientific community, we serve the commercial interests of giant companies by sticking our necks out for their R&D wings!