Vaccine
Vaccines
induce protection against infections by
stimulating the development of long-lived
effector cells and memory cells. Most vaccines
in routine use today work by inducing humoral
immunity, and attempts to stimulate
cell-mediated immune responses by vaccination
are ongoing. The success of active immunization
in eradicating infectious disease is dependent
on numerous factors. Vaccines are likely to be
must effective against infectious that are
limited to human hosts and are caused by poorly
infectious agents whose antigens are relatively
invariant.
On the
other hand, antigenic variation, the existence
of animal or environmental reservoirs of
infection, and high infectivity of the microbes
make it less likely that vaccination alone will
eradicate a particular infectious disease.
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