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Researchers at the Precision Vaccines Program at Boston Children’s Hospital recently partnered with the Expanded Program on Immunization Consortium, an international team studying early life immunization, to collect and comprehensively profile blood samples from newborns immunized with the century-old Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine, using a powerful “big data” approach.
The century-old Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine against tuberculosis is one of the world's oldest and most widely used vaccines, used to immunize 100 million newborns every year. Given in countries with endemic TB, it has surprisingly been found to protect newborns and young infants against multiple bacterial and viral infections unrelated to TB. There's even some evidence that it can reduce severity of COVID-19.
The global distribution of vaccines from a manufacturer to a local community is made possible through international entities, community health workers, and cold chain resources.
How PATH helped the Bangladesh Ministry of Health conduct an historic COVID-19 vaccination campaign in hard-to-reach Kurigram District.
2.7 million children in the Americas did not receive the vaccines needed to keep them healthy in 2020, while around 230 million people have still not received a single dose of COVID-19 vaccine in the region