What is a vaccine? How do they work? – Medical News Today
The immune system is the bodys natural defense mechanism. Most of the time, it works efficiently to combat invading pathogens. However, certain pathogens can overwhelm the immune system, causing serious infection and illness.
Vaccines are products that help the immune system combat invading disease-causing pathogens. They are a safe and effective method for preventing certain diseases.
This article outlines what vaccines are and how they work. It will also discuss the various stages that vaccines must go through to receive medical approval.
Vaccines are products that help prevent disease. They do this by preparing the body for exposure to disease-causing pathogens.
Today, vaccines help control and prevent a range of serious diseases. These include but are not limited to:
Vaccines train the immune system to detect and combat disease-causing pathogens. To understand how vaccines work, people will need to know how the immune system works.
Pathogenic viruses and bacteria have molecules on their surface called antigens. These antigens stimulate the immune system to produce proteins called antibodies. The antibodies bind to the antigens, thereby killing or disabling the pathogen.
Different pathogens have different antigens on their surface. A pathogen can only be killed or disabled by an antibody that is capable of binding to its antigens. These antibodies will only exist if the immune system has encountered the antigen in the past.
Vaccines safely expose the body to pathogens so that the immune system can make antibodies capable of binding to their antigens. This allows the immune system to fight off a specific disease-causing pathogen should it encounter that pathogen in the future.
Vaccines expose the body to pathogenic antigens. To do this, they contain one or more of the following:
Vaccine injections contain several other components, including:
It is worth noting that in most cases, the manufacturer will remove the formaldehyde before packaging.
There are four main types of vaccine. These are:
DNA and recombinant vector vaccines are two additional types of vaccine that are still in the experimental stages of development.
Below is a list of current Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved vaccines:
It takes about 1015 years to develop a vaccine for a specific disease.
Vaccine development and testing stages vary from country to country. Below is the process for vaccine approval in the United States.
The developmental stage consists of the following three substages:
Approved applications go on to the following three phases of testing:
If the phase III trial is successful, developers will send a Biologics License Application to the FDA. The FDA will then inspect the manufacturing location and either approve or reject the vaccine for labeling.
Once the FDA license a vaccine, inspections and monitoring will continue. Monitoring activities include phase IV trials (such as optional studies for testing safety and effectiveness) and the use of a Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (which allows people to report adverse reactions that may be associated with the vaccine).
Vaccines are products that prepare the immune system to detect and eradicate certain disease-causing pathogens. Ultimately, vaccines help reduce the devastating impact of preventable diseases.
Each vaccine must go through a process of development, testing, and monitoring to ensure that it is safe and effective. The FDA will only approve a particular vaccine once it has passed this rigorous process.
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