Essay Example on Vaccination: Declining Rates and Its Impact on Health Outcomes

Introduction

Background

Vaccination is one of the most reliable and practical ways of curbing the outbreak of communicable diseases and related morbidity and mortality (Andre, e.t al. 2008). It has reduced rates of mortality and improved health outcomes by more than 90% (Orenstein and Ahmed, 2017). Regardless of these benefits, there has been a massive decline in the number of people who are being vaccinated both internationally and in the United Kingdom (UK).

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Recent research revealed that between 2010-2017 more than 500, 000 children were not vaccinated against measles in the UK (UNICEF 2019). This has led to re-emergence of infections or diseases, such as measles, that have been previously eradicated or controlled.

The UK is in danger of an impending pandemic due to a decline in vaccinations against rubella, mumps, and measles among infants who are 3 years and below (Boseley 2019). The decline in vaccinations in England is shown in figure 1. To avoid such occurrences, the UK can implement policies that will ensure the mandatory immunisation of children. The policies have worked in countries like Polland and Latvia, where some vaccines are mandatory for public health concerns (Bozzola et al. 2018). There are several benefits of taking vaccinations; however, in the UK, there are certain barriers to vaccinations.

Research Questions

Are there any benefits of vaccinating children in the UK for the health of the UK population?

Can the barriers to mandatory vaccination be overcome for the realisation of the benefits of vaccination in the UK?

Aim

To investigate the benefits of mandatory vaccinations in the UK by revealing barriers to the implementation of mandatory vaccines in the country

Objectives

Provide recommendations on how mandatory vaccination of children in the UK should be pursued.

Determine the benefits of mandatory vaccinations of children to human health among UK citizens.

Provide recommendations on a framework for bringing down barriers to mandatory vaccination of children in the UK.

Establish the barriers to mandatory vaccinations of children in the UK.

Research

Methodology

The project employed a systematic review research approach where qualitative, quantitative, and mixed-method studies were examined. The databases used to search the articles included Cochrane registry, MEDLINE, Cumulative Index of Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), and Excerpta Medical database (EMBASE). Citation screening of eligible studies was done through Google Scholar to prevent the incidental exclusion of articles (Preston et al. 2015).

The Boolean operators used were "Vaccination" OR "vaccine" OR "immunisation" AND "mandatory." The researchers only included articles that were peer-reviewed, published from 2000 onwards, full-texts that are in the English language, and based on the UK or other western countries.

Analysis

Pre-developed proformas were used to extract information from the eligible studies. Thematic analysis was used to analyse data for the research.

Model

The Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) serves a purpose in crisis communication, and it was developed by W. Timothy Coombs (Coombs 2007). The theory posits that the obligation for crisis communication is on the authorities who should contain the threat posed by the crisis. It is related to the Attribution Theory, which states that people constantly make attributions or find causes for negative or unexpected events. Based on the attribution mentality people will respond emotionally to a negative outcome (Coombs, 2007)

Results

A total of 4, 123 articles were found. 1009 were from MEDLINE, 722 from CINAHL, 381 from Google Scholar, and 2011 from EMBASE. After eliminating duplicated studies, only 302 sources remained. Out of the 302, 109 of the articles were not accessible. After further analysis, 180 of the sources did not meet the inclusion criteria; hence, only 13 articles remained, and they were evaluated using the CASP tool.

Conclusion

Conclusion

Mandatory vaccines can be effective in preventing the outbreak of communicable diseases. The barriers to uptake of vaccines include poor attitudes by parents, lack of education, and inadequate policies that advocate for vaccination of children.

Recommendations

The concerned bodies should provide guidelines on how mandatory vaccinations can be conducted in the UK. They can come up with strategies that will help in reducing barriers to mandatory vaccination of infants in the UK.

Discussion

The factors that affect how parents adhere to mandatory vaccination of their children include lack of awareness, attitudes of parents, poor access to medical facilities, lack of education, and poor socio-economic status. The research identified a gap in that there is no policy that emphasises on the importance of implementing mandatory vaccinations on populations.

References

Andre, F. E., R. Booy, H. L. Bock, J. Clemens, S. K. Datta, T. J. John, B. W. Lee, et al. 2008. "Vaccination greatly reduces diseases, disability, death and inequity worldwide." Bulletin of the Word Health Organization 86 (2): pp. 140-146. [Online]. Available at: doi:10.2471/blt.07.040089. [Date accessed: 13 March. 2020].

Boseley, S. 2019. "Drop in vaccination rates in England alarming, experts warn." The Guardian, 26 September. [Online]. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/sep/26/drop-in-vaccination-rates-in-england-alarming-experts-warn .[ Date accessed: 27 March 2020].

Bozzola, E., G. Spina, R. Russo, M. Bozzola, G. Corsello, and A Villani. 2018. "Mandatory vaccinations in European countries, undocumented information, false news and the impact on vaccination uptake: The position of the Italian Pediatric society." Italian Journal of Pediatrics 44 (1): pp. 67-75. Available at: doi:10.1186/s13052-018-0504-y . [Date accessed: 13 March. 2020].

Coombs, William T. 2007. Crisis management and communications.[Online]. Avaible at: http://www.instituteforpr.org/topics/crisis-management-and-communications/ . [Date accessed: 14 March 2020].

Nowell, L S, J M Norris, D E White, and N J Moules. 2017. "Thematic analysis: Striving to meet the trustworthiness criteria." International Journal of Qualitative Methods 16 (1): pp. 1-13. [Online]. Available at: doi:10.1177/1609406917733847. [Date accessed: 17 March. 2020].

Orenstein, W A, and R Ahmed. 2017. "Simply put: Vaccination saves lives." Proceedings of National Academic Science USA 114 (16): pp. 4031-4033. [Online]. Available at: doi:10.1073/pnas.1704507114.[ Date accessed: 13 March. 2020].

Preston, L, C Carroll, P Gardois, S Paisley, and E Kaltenthaler. 2015. "Improving search efficacy for systematic reviews of diagnostic test accuracy: An exploratory study to assess the viabliity of limiting to MEDLINE, EMBASE and refrence checking." Systematic Review 4: pp. 82-89. [Online]. Available at: doi:10.1186/s13643-015-0074-7. [Date accessed: 17 March. 2020].

UNICEF. 2019. Over 20 million children worldwide missed out on measles vaccine annually in past 8 years, creating a pathway to current global outbreaks.[Online]. Available at https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/over-20-million-children-worldwide-missed-out-measles-vaccine-annually-past-8-years . [Date accessed: 13 March. 2020].