Childhood Vaccination Versus Cost-Benefit Analysis
ors, Allow us to introduce ourselves. We are a committed group of nurses studying to become certified nurse practitioners. With our education and experience, we are in a strong position to influence public policy on matters of health. One way to accomplish this is to contact our elected officials, informing them of problems, suggesting solutions, and enlisting legislative support. We are writing to you on a matter of great importance--childhood vaccinations. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) (2016b) has prepared a schedule of recommended vaccines for children from birth through age 18 years old. These recommended vaccines will protect children from a host of illnesses, many of which that can potentially be fatal. These conditions include
…show more content…
To make this possible immunization costs need to be considered within a policy. Cost-benefit analysis (CBA) is the most common approach to systematically compare the costs and effects of health-care interventions (Bärnighausen et al., 2011). As health professionals, we deem it necessary to include this type of analysis to form successful vaccination programs. Vaccinations can be made cost effective invoking policy change related to mandatory immunizations. One cost effective strategy is combining more than one vaccination into a vial. Many of the vaccination costs commonly included in CBA can be reduced when, instead of delivering a vaccine in single, monovalent form, it is added to an existing vaccine formulation and administered as a multivalent solution (Bärnighausen et al., 2011). We believe cost should include the vaccine, vials and healthcare workers. After researching we decided to model our cost based on the UNICEF/WHO 2009 Immunization Summary and the UNICEF 2009 Vaccine Projections, which showed a single dose of Hib would cost $ 3.4, a dose of DTP–Hib would cost $ 3.1, and costs are projected to be even lower, at US$ 2.8, when the Hib is part of the DTP–Hep–Hib as a multivalent solution vaccine (as cited in Bärnighausen et al.,
To make this possible immunization costs need to be considered within a policy. Cost-benefit analysis (CBA) is the most common approach to systematically compare the costs and effects of health-care interventions (Bärnighausen et al., 2011). As health professionals, we deem it necessary to include this type of analysis to form successful vaccination programs. Vaccinations can be made cost effective invoking policy change related to mandatory immunizations. One cost effective strategy is combining more than one vaccination into a vial. Many of the vaccination costs commonly included in CBA can be reduced when, instead of delivering a vaccine in single, monovalent form, it is added to an existing vaccine formulation and administered as a multivalent solution (Bärnighausen et al., 2011). We believe cost should include the vaccine, vials and healthcare workers. After researching we decided to model our cost based on the UNICEF/WHO 2009 Immunization Summary and the UNICEF 2009 Vaccine Projections, which showed a single dose of Hib would cost $ 3.4, a dose of DTP–Hib would cost $ 3.1, and costs are projected to be even lower, at US$ 2.8, when the Hib is part of the DTP–Hep–Hib as a multivalent solution vaccine (as cited in Bärnighausen et al.,