On June 11, 2022, Seniors Today hosted our weekly Health Live Webinar. This week we had with us Dr Hemalata Arora, who shed light on Adult Immunisation.
Dr Hemalata Arora is a very senior internal medicine specialist, with nearly 25 years of experience. An MBBS, MD and DNB in medicine, She is certified ( 2009), and recertified ( 2019) by the American Board of Internal Medicine. She is a Senior Consultant at the Nanavati Max Super Speciality Hospital and was Head of Department of Medicine at Seven Hills Hospital, Mumbai. She received the coveted Paul Bunn Award for “the most promising,” in the field of Infectious diseases, awarded by Suny Upstate Medical University, New York.
- We do not, at the moment, have a medication/ vaccination against omicron available with us in India.
- All the other vaccines against the corona virus are against the spike protein. And with every booster dose that one takes, the efficacy of the vaccine does go up.
- Despite taking the 2 doses of the vaccine, there were individuals who still contracted the disease. And there was a study which was done neck to neck with individuals who had taken the vaccine and those who hadn’t. And it showed that individuals who had received the vaccine contracted a less severe form of the disease.
The vaccine does not prevent the virus from entering the upper respiratory tract of the body, it will still go and inhabit the upper respiratory tract and cause inflammation, but no further. That is the promise of the vaccine, that it will not cause a serious disease, a morbid condition.
- Nasal vaccines, though seem convenient, do not produce a good enough immune response.
- Symptomatic individuals should refrain from socialising. If you are someone who is vulnerable such as individuals on chemotherapy, renal disease, etc.- mask up, avoid large gatherings. It is another wave, it’ll peak in another 2 weeks and it will hopefully settle.
- A vaccination is where we introduce a product that resembles the virus or the bacteria that is causing the disease which then insights immunity in the individuals and builds the individual’s immunity by giving it a memory, which in turn helps in fighting the virus/ bacteria, if it enters the body in the future.
- Vaccines do come with their effects and side effects which can be discussed. And the side effects are very minimal when compared to the benefits it provides.
- Vaccines act by either completely preventing the disease or by reducing the effects of the disease.
- Vaccines also cause/ lead to herd immunity.
- There are multiple vaccine preventable diseases. There are approximately 25-30 of them; a lot of them are more common. Hep B, Diphtheria, tetanus, Japanese encephalitis are all vaccine preventable diseases.
- Getting vaccinated regularly is important, even as an adult. This is because our immune system also treats a vaccine as an outside, foreign object. Which means that any vaccination received in childhood is going to give us a lifetime immunity because slowly slowly not only does our immune system forget but it also sort of clears it out from our immune memory.
- As we age, so does our immune system. For example, influenza or pneumonia might not have caused serious symptoms or disease when we were younger but as we grow older, cross the age of 60-65, the consequences of contracting the disease also become more severe.
- Individuals who have a constant health care touch point will benefit from taking the Hep B vaccine, this includes people in the healthcare sector, patients who require regular dialysis, blood transfusions, diabetic patients, etc. Hep B is one of the most efficient vaccines.
- The influenza vaccine is an annual vaccine. The influenza virus is an ever changing virus. You can take the vaccine a week or 2 before the monsoon season. It is also important to take this vaccine, especially now that we have covid in the picture too. Because sometimes, some patients can suffer from both covid and influenza and if you are vaccinated against influenza, you are at least covered from that aspect of the disease. Same is the case with pneumonia and influenza.
- Anyone who has lung conditions or respiratory problems or even asthma, regardless of age, you should take the pneumonia vaccine.
