This year began with a number of bad news related to vaccinations, and more precisely – with their lack. These are just a few of the most famous from our yard.
The number of cases of measles reported in the European Region of the World Health Organization (WHO) is the highest in over 25 years. Out of 127 350 cases reported in 2024, over 40 percent It concerned children under the age of five. Let us point out that in Poland in recent years We have lost population resistance to this disease.
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In February, almost 5,000 pertussis cases and 52,000 RSV infections were confirmed in Poland – according to the data of the National Institute of Public Health – PZH. This is a significant, because respectively as much as a two- and three-time increase in the number of cases compared to January this year. Both diseases can have a serious course and cause serious complications.
In mid -March, the eyes of all over Poland – and as it turned out a moment later also the world – they were directed to Wrocław, where a six -year -old with diphtheria came to the hospital. A disease that in Poland, thanks to vaccinations, has gone into oblivion years ago. The boy fought for his life, and sanitary services had to look for hundreds of passengers with whom he had previously traveled in several Zanzibar aircraft.
Wrocław Center for Infectious Diseases, where a boy with diphtheria is treated Krzysztof Ćwik/PAP
– We have a margin of two weeks. If there are no new cases, we will be able to consider the incident off. So we are waiting until the end of March with the possible end of the epidemic investigation – handed over the Chief Sanitary Inspector.
On Tuesday, March 25, a patient with diphtheria suspected went to the Provincial Specialist Hospital in Olsztyn. The 30-year-old is in serious condition. The services check the toxicity of bacteria.
TVN attention. Patient with diphtheria with the symptoms of the disease TVN attention
I throw all these data on one breath at the beginning of the conversation with the habilitated doctor Michał Wróblewski, one of the authors research report “Between trust and fear. Diagnosis of attitudes and direction of support for vaccination prevention in Poland”.
I am asking: Is it time to get used to such bad messages?
A sociologist from the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and the Institute of Innovation and Technology Łukasiewicz -Itech wonders for a while and spreads his hands: – I think so. We will have a very large crisis associated with resistance to infectious diseases. And it is associated with the fact that we have neglected vaccination prevention in various fields. Public opinion may not realize this yet, but there will be more and more such dramatic situations related to health. It would be good that we would not get used to it, but start working – he adds.
And I want to find out what actions the state should take, and which – apart from vaccinations – can be taken by each of us.
From crisis to crisis
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