S] [VACCINATION

Amayeza on 0860 160 160 for advice and information.

The major benefit of the EPI SA is that all the vaccines are offered for free, whereas if you go to a private clinic you will have to pay for each vaccine as well as an additional consultation fee, which can range from R100 to R300.

“In the past, at some of the private clinics you could also get some of the vaccines from the state so you wouldn’t have to pay for them, but this was stopped at the end of last year,” says Sister Ingrid Groenewald, a registered nurse and private midwife. It can become very expensive if you don’t have medical aid to cover it. “The vaccines your baby needs at six and 14 weeks can add up to almost R2 000 for each visit and if you are already earning less because you are on maternity leave or haven’t been paid out your benefits yet, this can cause financial pressure,” says Sr Ingrid. She recommends you start putting aside some money for the vaccines while you are still pregnant, or ask friends or family to gift the money for vaccines instead of giving your baby toys or clothes at birth.

The quality of state and private supplied vaccines don’t differ. “Both schedules are excellent,” confirms Dr Suchard. “The state schedule is based on what is going to protect South Africans from a herd immunity perspective, and what is going to prevent transmission of these diseases, so that we can aim for disease eradication.” The private schedule includes a few additional beneficial vaccine options, but they are expensive and the government has considered them not cost effective for inclusion into the national vaccine programme, usually because there’s no indication that the vaccines would prevent transmission of the disease to others, she says. So they are really for individual protection, but they wouldn’t prevent that disease circulating in the country.

The vaccine programmes are interchangeable, confirms Sr Ingrid. “It doesn’t mean if you start at a private clinic you can’t go to a state clinic at a later stage. You can alternate between them. Some patients attend the state clinics for the vaccines that are offered for free, and then come to the private clinic for the optional ones,” she says. So why would your baby need these optional vaccines if the state doesn’t consider them essential? There are numerous benefits to preventing your child from getting these infections, confirms Dr Glass.

Approximate cost R400. BENEFITS Chicken pox is an uncomfortable infection that can lead to scarring and in some cases complications such as pneumonia and death. “Vaccinating against chicken pox also significantly reduces the risk of developing shingles as an adult,” says Dr Glass.

There is currently a worldwide shortage of chicken pox vaccines, so Sr Ingrid recommends you check for availability with your clinic and have the vaccine done as soon as possible if they have stock. vaccine protects against a viral infection that can cause inflammation of the liver resulting in severe illness for a number of weeks. “Infection of children with hepatitis A does not usually result in severe illness in the child, but can result in severe illness for the adults at home who are exposed to the infected child,” says Dr Glass.

Rubella is usually a mild infection in childhood, but if a woman is infected for the first time during pregnancy it can have devastating effects on the unborn baby, resulting in miscarriage or severe birth defects. “Vaccinating your child against rubella will protect her future pregnancies and will protect pregnant women who may be exposed to your child,” says Dr Glass, adding that there has been an increase in rubella cases in South Africa over the past three years.

Mumps is a viral infection that leads to painful swelling of the salivary glands. Complications of this infection can include meningitis and deafness, among others.

The measles vaccine is given at nine months and again at 18 months within the state clinic. But in a private clinic, the shot given after measles is the MMR. So if one just attends a state clinic you won’t have the MMR. However, the single measles vaccine is being phased out and only the MMR will be offered in the near future, confirms Sr Ingrid. But there is also another strain of bacterial meningitis called meningococcal disease that causes a very aggressive form of meningitis that is often deadly before it has been even been diagnosed. It’s only natural that as a parent you want to know what possible side effects your baby could suffer from vaccinations, but all the experts consulted in this piece agree that vaccines are rigorously tested and safe to use. Dr Suchard says the mild side effects that can occur include fever, redness, some swelling at the vaccine site and a bit of tenderness. “These are all signs that there has been an immune response and the vaccine is working,” she says.

Thanks to improvements that are regularly made to vaccines, Sr Ingrid has noticed babies in her clinic have suffered fewer side effects in the past two years. “It’s very unlikely now that your baby will be unhappy or a bit feverish after a vaccine, where in the past it was common,” she says. YB