Rebuilding public confidence in vaccines is a challenge that Brazil has faced in recent years. Health Minister Nisia Trindade said that resuming high vaccination coverage is a mission for society as a whole and that the government is working to regain its role as a health authority and a world reference in vaccination, as reported by
Toda Palavra, a partner of TV BRICS.

“Recovering the population’s confidence is a challenge that we are overcoming,” she said, highlighting, among other initiatives, the resumption of multi-vaccination campaigns.

Vaccination campaigns were started in the northern and border states precisely to reduce the risk of re-entry of diseases such as polio, after cases were identified in Peru. Brazil is on the list of countries at risk of this, according to the WHO.

For the minister, the National Immunisation Programme (PNI), which turns 50 in 2023, is a historic achievement for Brazilians.

“The PNI and the Unified Health System (SUS) are recognised all over the world and allow us to tackle more than 20 types of disease. We have eradicated smallpox, polio, rubella, congenital rubella syndrome and measles. Imagine if all these diseases spread again? With the drop in vaccination coverage in recent years, measles has unfortunately returned, and we have to do everything we can to prevent the return of polio,” said the minister.

She warns that the lack of immunisation puts lives at risk and points out that the growth in life expectancy and quality of life for Brazilians is closely linked to vaccination.

“Vaccination is one of the great gains of civilisation, making it possible to control and eradicate countless diseases. Its positive impact on health is compared by the World Health Organisation to that of access to drinking water. Both have given us a much better quality of life and are at the root of the significant increase in life expectancy over the last century in the country, which has jumped from 45.5 years in the 1940s to 77 years today,” she concluded.

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