Children and Youth Report
Not Corona! 680,000 fewer children vaccinated than before the pandemic
© istockphoto.com/Naumov/DAK
During the corona pandemic, underage children were significantly less vaccinated against diseases other than Covid than before. This emerges from the child and youth report of the health insurance company DAK.
Last year, 2021, there were eleven percent fewer vaccinations for children and young people than before 2019 – i.e. before the outbreak of the pandemic. According to health insurance projections, around 680,000 fewer children were vaccinated last year than in 2019, according to the results of a special analysis as part of the DAK-Gesundheit child and youth report.
Without vaccination, eradicated diseases can return
“We have been observing a decline in vaccination rates for children and young people for some time. This negative trend has intensified during the corona pandemic,” says Andreas Storm, CEO of DAK-Gesundheit. There would be an acute need for action, otherwise young people would suddenly be threatened again by diseases that were actually thought to have been eradicated. Against this background, Andreas Storm is calling for a broad education campaign to educate parents about the benefits of vaccinations and the risk of individual diseases.
Not only have vaccinations gone down, but the number of doctor visits has also decreased during the pandemic. For example, around 1.3 million fewer girls and boys went to the doctor’s office nationwide than before the pandemic – a drop of four percent. The decline in vaccinations and doctor visits during the lockdown phases is particularly noticeable.
Around 166,000 children are missing the vaccination against diphtheria and Co.
The overall vaccination against diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus and polio – the so-called Tdap-IPV vaccination – has declined the most, down 23 percent. Around 166,000 fewer children and adolescents were vaccinated in 2021. In the area of meningococcal C, even 200,000 fewer received a vaccination (a drop of 19 percent). Here there is still a clear difference between the overall vaccination – which includes the first, last and booster doses of a vaccination – and the first vaccination. A 31 percent decrease in Tdap-IPV can be seen in primary vaccinations.
The numbers for HPV vaccinations for cancer prevention also fell in 2021. Total vaccinations fell by 13 percent and primary vaccinations by a good quarter (24 percent). The drop of 26 percent was even clearer for boys than for girls with 22 percent.
For the children and youth report, the scientific team from Vandage and the University of Bielefeld examined accounting data from around 782,000 children and youths up to the age of 17 who are insured with DAK-Gesundheit. The analysis period was from 2019 to 2021. “The professional association of paediatricians can confirm the analysis results,” says President Dr. Thomas Fischbach. “The persistently high number of infections will certainly also have a negative impact on vaccination rates, some of which have fallen by double digits. We have to close the vaccination gaps now.”
Source used: DAK press release, dak.de
This article originally appeared on PARENTS.