Peer-reviewed article
Effectiveness of Universal Varicella Vaccination after ten years of implementation in Tuscany (Central Italy).
Angela Bechini, Benedetta Bonito, Alessandra Ninci, Veronica Gallinoro, Fabio Voller et al. ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study evaluated Italy's universal varicella vaccination program in Tuscany over ten years (2010-2019) in children born 2008-2017. The researchers measured how well the vaccine prevented varicella cases and hospitalizations by checking vaccination records of children who got the disease. The vaccine was highly effective: one dose prevented 85% of cases and 98.5% of hospitalizations, while two doses prevented 96% of cases and 100% of hospitalizations.
Key points
- Vaccine effectiveness for at least one dose was 84.8% (95% CI: 83.5-85.9%) in preventing varicella notifications
- Vaccine effectiveness for two doses was 95.7% (95% CI: 93.6-97.1%) in preventing notifications
- Vaccine effectiveness in preventing hospitalizations was 98.5% after one dose and 100% after two doses
- Median time from vaccination to breakthrough varicella onset was 34 months after first dose and 28 months after second dose
- Vaccination coverage was measured at 24 months and 5-6 years of age in targeted birth cohorts
Limitations
The study only examined data from one region of Italy (Tuscany) during the pre-pandemic period, so findings may not generalize to other regions or different time periods. The study did not compare outcomes with unvaccinated children or assess long-term immunity beyond the observation period.
Abstract
Varicella vaccination is currently recommended in several European countries, including Italy. Tuscany Region introduced Universal Varicella Vaccination (UVV) in 2008, and it was later included in the Italian National Immunization Plan 2017-2019. Recently, it has also been made mandatory in Italy for school attendance. The aim of our study was to assess the effectiveness of the UVV program in preventing varicella cases and related hospitalizations in children born between 2008 and 2017, during the pre-pandemic period (2010-2019) in Tuscany (Central Italy). We applied the screening method to assess varicella vaccine effectiveness (VE) for the first and the second vaccine dose in the birth cohorts targeted by the UVV. We considered the vaccination coverage (VC) at 24 months and at 5-6 y of age, and we verified the vaccination status of each notified or hospitalized case to identify breakthrough varicella cases (BV). We assessed a VE of 84.8% (95%CI:83.5-85.9%) for at least one varicella vaccine dose and 95.7% (95% CI: 93.6-97.1%) for the second dose in preventing notifications. VE in preventing hospitalizations was 98.5% (95% CI: 96.7-99.3%) after one dose and 100% after two doses. The median time interval between the first or second vaccine dose and the onset of varicella was 34 months and 28 months, respectively. Our study demonstrated the excellent vaccine effectiveness profile of the vaccines used over a 10-y period in Tuscany, in preventing notified and hospitalized varicella cases in the target cohorts of children, confirming the health benefits of the UVV in Central Italy.
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Universal varicella vaccination program with two-dose schedule
- Population
- Children born between 2008 and 2017 in Tuscany, Italy, targeted by the universal vaccination program
Key finding
One-dose varicella vaccine effectiveness: 84.8% (95% CI: 83.5-85.9%) in preventing notifications