Impact of vaccination on the epidemiology and prognosis of pneumonia

ABSTRACT

Adults with lung diseases, comorbidities, smokers, andelderly are at risk of lung infections and their consequences.Community-acquired pneumonia happen in more than 1% ofpeople each year. Possible pathogens of community-acquiredpneumonia include viruses, pneumococcus and atypicals. TheCDC recommend vaccination throughout life to provide immunity, but vaccination rates in adults are poor.Tetravalent and trivalent influenza vaccine is designed annually during the previous summer for the next season. Theavailable vaccines include inactivated, adjuvant, double dose,and attenuated vaccines. Their efficacy depends on the variantof viruses effectively responsible for the outbreak each year,and other reasons.Regarding the pneumococcal vaccine, there coexist theold polysaccharide 23-valent vaccine with the new conjugate10-valent and 13-valent conjugate vaccines. Conjugate vaccinesdemonstrate their usefulness to reduce the incidence of pneumococcal pneumonia due to the serotypes present in the vaccine.Whooping cough is still present, with high morbidity andmortality rates in young infants. Adult’s pertussis vaccine isavailable, it could contribute to the control of whooping coughin the most susceptible, but it is not present yet in the calendarof adults around the world.About 10 vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 have been developedin a short time, requiring emergency use authorization. A highrate of vaccination was observed in most of the countries. Boosterdoses became frequent after the loss of effectiveness against newvariants. The future of this vaccine is yet to be written. (AU)