Department of Community and Family Medicine, AIIMS Bathinda, and Department of Community Medicine and School of Public Health, PGIMER Chandigarh jointly organized a national CME through a virtual platform to observe the world Immunization Day that is celebrated on November 10th.
The CME was attended by over 300 participants from different parts of the country. Prof. D.K Singh, Executive director, AIIMS Bathinda inaugurated the CME and highlighted the need for such sessions. The experts who participated in the CME included Prof Madhu Gupta, Prof Ashish Bhalla from PGIMER Chandigarh, Prof Bhola Nath and Dr. Madhur Verma from AIIMS Bathinda, Prof. Rakesh Aggarwal (Director JIPMER, Puducherry), Prof Gagandeep Kang (CMC Vellore), Dr. Brian Wahl (John Hopkins University, USA), Dr. Sashi Kant (GGS Medical College Faridkot), Dr. Deepak Polpakara (MoHFW, New Delhi), Dr. Raj Shankar Ghosh (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, New Delhi)
CME started with the deliberation of Professor Dr. Madhu, where she highlighted the need for Adult Immunization, while Professor Kang discussed the key challenges of introducing adult immunization into the Policy of the country.
Dr. Ashish Bhalla enlightened the audience with recent updates on Adult Immunization and explained the importance of vaccination in senior citizens. He also emphasized the role of vaccination in health care workers especially annual influenza vaccination, varicella, MMR, a booster dose of Tdap.
Dr. Brian Wahl touched upon the methods to minimize vaccine Hesitancy, especially when some people are not believing in COVID-19 vaccines. The lectures were followed by a panel discussion.
Dr. Rakesh Aggarwal explained that at this moment science does not favor the need for a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccines. Instead, it is important to use the available vaccine stocks judiciously and preference should be given to those who have not received 2 doses rather than giving a booster dose to the healthy person who has completed 2 doses.
Then Dr. Sashi Kant deliberated upon the introduction of the Covid vaccine in children and talked about the various pros and cons of vaccinating this age group. He said that the risk-benefit ratio suggests that as schools are reopening, it is important to introduce the vaccine to reduce the emergence of Variants of concern, reduce community transmission, achieve satisfactory herd immunity, and avoid subsequent waves. However, Vaccination should be prioritized for children with co-morbidities.
The CME was concluded by remarks from Dr. Deepak Polpakara who appealed to the public to report any kind of adverse event following the COVID-19 vaccination through the COWIN app and help in establishing the safety of the existing vaccines.