Dengvaxia or Death-vaxia

Dengue Vaccine also known as “Dengvaxia” has been all around the news for it may be
connected to the deaths of 14 children who were immunized by the vaccine. Instead of curing the
patients, it is said that these children have developed severe dengue which resulted to their death. Is it
really just a coincidence that those children were vaccinated by Dengvaxia or it is the main cause of the
demise?

Different studies have showed that the Dengue Vaccine could lead to an increase in the number
of dengue infections. But still, the health department continues the vaccination program. Sanofi Pateur,
a French multinational pharmaceutical company, developed the Dengvaxia which will be given to the
public school students. It was on November 2017 when the drug firm showed a clinical data analysis that
Dengvaxia is more risky for those individuals who are not yet infected by the virus. Days after the
announcement, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III, ordered the temporary suspension of the
immunization program.

The Philippines spent 3.5 billion pesos ($68 million) on the dengue vaccination program that put
733,000 public school children at risk. After the immunization, 14 of the children died. According to
Sanofi and some local experts, there is no conclusive proof that will link the deaths of 14 children to the
drug per se. However, in three cases there was a significant relation between the Dengvaxia and the
fatalities.

“They died of dengue even (though) they were given Dengvaxia. Two of them may have died
because of vaccine failure”, Health Undersecretary Enrique Domingo told a news conference. The
Philippines has already fined Sanofi with $2,000, for violations in product registration and marketing.

From an article in CNN Philippines, the World Health Organization has released a paper on July
2016, which entails that Dengvaxia “may act as a silent natural infection that primes seronegative
vaccinees to experience a secondary-like infection upon their first exposure to dengue virus”. In other
words, the vaccine may not work as expected and it can even increase the risk of severe dengue to
those who have never been exposed to the virus.

There is an estimated of 390 million dengue infections per year, according to the World Health
Organization (WHO). In which, 500,000 people each year, develop severe dengue resulting in 25,000
deaths annually worldwide.

The fears over the dengue vaccine have led to the decrease of numbers in immunisation rates
for preventable diseases. According to Under-Secretary Enrique Domingo many parents were refusing to
get their children vaccinated for polio, chicken pox and tetanus. With these, the effect of the Dengvaxia
doesn’t just circles around dengue itself but other diseases too. Mr. Domingo worries about the
potential epidemics in the Philippines regarding the fears of the parents in giving their children vaccines.