Baby vaccination rate down to decades-low point below 90 percent

A growing group of Dutch children have not received the standard vaccinations against infectious diseases. For the first time in decades, the vaccination rate of the youngest age group was slightly below 90 percent last year, reported the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). The institute is concerned about this trend. State Secretary Maarten van Ooijen (Public Health) also called it “really worrying.”

“A high vaccination rate is essential to continue to protect people against serious diseases and to prevent outbreaks of these diseases,” the RIVM stressed.

There has now been a decline for two years in a row. Jeanne Marie Hament, manager of the National Immunization Program (RVP), hopes the trend can be reversed. Otherwise, there is a threat of “health inequality” between people who have and have not been vaccinated, she said.

The RIVM thinks that the decrease may be related to the coronavirus pandemic and the mistrust that some developed against vaccines or the government in general. Van Ooijen also pointed to “disinformation” that circulated during the pandemic years.

Hament called it important to talk to people about their doubts so that they can be addressed. “We need to learn to listen to each other better,” she said. The State Secretary also wants to “understand better how we can approach groups that are not participating at the moment.”

Within the RVP, children receive vaccinations from their infancy that protect against mumps, measles, rubella (MMR), diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, polio (DPTP), and pneumococcal disease, among other things. A high vaccination rate is essential to protect against highly contagious diseases like measles, the RIVM explained. In previous generations, the vaccination rate was always well above 90 percent. So the protection is “generally still very good,” Hament said.

However, if vaccination rates fall for years, diseases can resurface. “We are not there yet,” said Van Ooijen. “But, of course, we have to do everything we can to prevent it from happening.”

The RIVM has launched a research program to answer questions like how to best inform people about vaccinations and how you can make them as accessible as possible.

According to the figures, between 87.3 and 90 percent of babies born in 2020 got the various vaccines. The RIVM added that some people refuse to register their vaccinations, so some underreporting may exist.