How does Hepatitis B vaccination rate compare?

A survey by the Canadian Vaccine Information Centre (CVI) found that 64% of parents in Toronto “were certain or somewhat likely” to get their children vaccinated against Hepatitis B, for whom there are no proven vaccines. The findings were published Monday in Vaccine: Canada’s leading source of non-invasive, scientifically-based information on vaccines.

Hepatitis B is also called “serogroup 19,” although others use a more technical name of CVID-19. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CVID-19 was first discovered in the late 1960s; it’s transmitted mainly through feces, but can also be spread through sexual contact.

With the unvaccinated, transmission would be less and could spread among people who may not have a risk of contracting the virus, but have contact with the infected person, CVI said.

Hepatitis B is a virus that can cause serious liver disease and death, CVI said. Children can be vaccinated against the disease at 10 months of age; vaccination at 4, 6 and 12 months protects against hepatitis B in most children.

The survey of more than 250 Toronto parents revealed that 7% of those asked said they were not likely to get their children vaccinated against Hepatitis B, and 2% were unsure.

To gauge the responses, CVI asked parents if they were “certain” or “somewhat likely” to be getting their children vaccinated “often or often enough.” One-quarter said they were certain, and 74% were either somewhat or not likely to get their children vaccinated.

The data help show that it’s difficult to gauge the level of non-vaccination and non-adherence. In 2017, about 58% of the Canadian population received at least one dose of vaccine against Hepatitis B. Based on these survey results, CVI found that 58% of Toronto families were also vaccinating their children against CVID-19. That result matched numbers compiled from Quebec and Ontario in 2015.

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