ABSTRACT

Abstract

The advent of outbreaks runs in tandem with public health concern to study and to find therapies to cure or vaccines to prevent diseases. The reality of disease has since time immemorial triggered different medical interventions and protocols to manage them through scientific knowledge based on trial and error aimed at improving health and protecting people. In confronting public health crises, especially those predisposed by pandemics, epidemics and endemics, medical experts stress the fact that in the absence of therapies or cures, vaccines are the best and most effective medical interventions to eliminate wild-type pathogens globally. Epidemiologists also assert that to protect against diseases with far-reaching and expansive impacts vaccination is the best intervention, done over a lifespan and done routinely. But in times of outbreaks, such as the now infamous COVID-19, concern for vaccine development usually receives heightened attention often resulting in proponents and opponents being pitted against each other, therefore making the subject more contestable as it was aeons ago. This paper explores points of contestation to biomedical development through historical as well as current perspectives. The paper also gives a historical account of pandemics and their effect in terms of human cost and makes a point that in spite of controversies surrounding vaccines, they are still the best and most effective interventions to prevent disease and protect populations against outbreaks. The paper bases on secondary sources to present the case.

Keywords: vaccines, vaccination, infectious diseases, pathogens, pandemic, epidemic, endemic.