Evaluation of the seasonal vaccine coverage in Portugal: an overview of the last 12 years

Poster presentation: abstract publicado em: ESCAIDE - European Scientific Conference on Applied Infectious Disease Epidemiology Lisbon, 11–13 November 2010 - : abstrat book / ECDC. Stockholm, 2011, p. 159 http://ecdc.europa.eu/EEC746B8-1081-41EC-9DA0-EC931E62D351/FinalDownload/DownloadId-D5A5C02CF969FCA25ACF210A0E8EFD09/EEC746B8-1081-41EC-9DA0-EC931E62D351/en/ESCAIDE/Documents/ESCAIDE2010_abstract_book.pdfInfluenza is an infectious disease responsible for seasonal epidemics affecting population worldwide. The vaccine is the main method for preventing flu and its more severe complications. For the past 12 years, the Department of Epidemiology of the National Institute of Health analyses the vaccine coverage in mainland Portugal. This study analyzes the evolution of the seasonal vaccine coverage since 1998-1999 untill 2009/2010. Also, we intend to characterize the practice of vaccination according to initiative, local, calendar and attitudes. We used a cross-sectional descriptive design based on a telephone interview survey conducted to households of the ECOS panel. This panel has 1078 households (approximately 3000 individuals), randomly selected, stratified by mainland regions (NUTsII) and contactable by landline and mobile phone. Results were weighted by number of households per region and according to sex and age population distribution. In season 1998/99 the vaccine coverage (VC) was 14.2 (CI95%: 11.6-16.8) and has been increasing progressively, reaching 20.4% (CI95%:18.3-22.6) in the last season (2009/2010). In the 2009/2010 season, as in others seasons, the elderly (VC=52.2%) and individuals with at least one chronicle condition (VC=37.4%) were the main contributors of this increase. Over the years, the initiative of vaccination belongs to the general practitioners and the health centres were most referred as the local of vaccination. The immunization period take place between October and November. In the last season, the main reason for non vaccination was related to mechanisms of devaluation/denial of the disease importance (45.7%). In the last season, the increase of the vaccine coverage may be attributable to the circulation of the pandemic virus. In general, the vaccine coverage has been high among the risk groups