The very idea of a vaccine is to prevent a disease from occurring. By exposing the body to a small part of an infectious agent that causes a disease, but doing so in a killed or weakened form, the body develops a defense against the disease. In a sense, vaccines can be argued to be the ultimate form of preparedness, as they prevent the disease from occurring in the first place, or at least mitigate it.
Preparedness is about preparation, making sure that something is ready to be used when needed (as described in more detail in a previous article in this series). By extension, it can then be said that preparedness is all about creating the right conditions to cope with something. Taking it one step further, the ultimate preparedness would then be to create a situation where the need never arises, that the situation we are preparing for never happens.
Vaccines - a preparedness tool
By that reasoning, it is easy to see vaccines as the ultimate preparedness tool, as their purpose is to prevent a situation, in this case a disease, from occurring or being alleviated. Consequently, vaccines are an important part of health crisis preparedness.
- 'I think you can definitely see vaccines as fundamentally a preparedness tool, both for the individual and for public health. Through vaccination, we prevent outbreaks of infectious diseases that create both suffering at the individual level and problems at the societal level,' says Helena Hervius Askling, infectious disease physician, associate professor and expert coordinator in infectious diseases and vaccine preparedness at the Centre for Health Crises.
Vaccines - part of the management
But vaccines are not only part of preparedness, they also play a part in handling a health crisis. This was seen not least during the COVID-19 pandemic, when pre-existing basic research and ongoing collaborations became crucial to do record-breaking vaccine development and pandemic management.
Helena agrees that vaccine development is important, both as part of both health crisis preparedness and management, but she also emphasises that vaccines and vaccination are about so much more than just what is in the injection.
- 'It is about so many different aspects. It is about vaccine development, of course, but also about vaccine use, logistics and availability. We are currently seeing how vaccines for Mpox are not sufficiently available where they are most needed, especially in the DRC. At the same time, vaccines are also very much about trust and knowledge, because they are only effective if people actually take them and on a large enough scale,' she says.
The Centre for Health Crises is particularly interested in how the expertise available in higher education institutions can contribute to health crisis preparedness and management, and Helena focuses in particular on issues related to infectious diseases and vaccines. You can find out more about her, her colleagues and the work of the Centre as a whole on their website. You can also receive news and updates from the Centre directly to your inbox by subscribing to their newsletter.
