| ABSTRACT Objective:To systematically study the infant deaths after receiving hepatitis B virus vaccine (HBV) during Nov. to Dec. 2013 and the attitudes of common people, and to analyze the causes for these accidents and the risk prevention measures, as well as science communication for vaccination risk. Methods:We investigated two groups of respondents with medical background (group A, 35) and no medical background (group B, 32) to observe their views about the vaccine accidents and the relativity between the infant deaths and HBV quality. In addition, we collected and analyzed from all kinds of media about these accidents, such as the time of vaccination and death, accident region, production enterprises and batch number of vaccine, parturition, sex, etc. Results:We found that 40% of group A and 12.5% of group B of the respondents believed these accidents were not relevant to the HBV quality. 54.3% of group A and 65.6% of group B thought the infants would die after their first vaccination, while 5.7% and 6.3% thought the infants would die after second vaccination. During November to December, at least 21 infants (male 16, female 5) died after receiving HBV vaccine, and 19 babies died in 19 regions respectively. The batch numbers of 3 cases and regions of 2 cases were unknown. Only 2 infants received the same batch number of vaccine. 6 infants (28.6%) died after their first vaccination, and 13 infants (61.9%) died after second vaccination. 10 infants died after combined vaccination. Combined vaccination of different vaccines, premature or cesarean infants gave rise to 47.6% of deaths in these accidents. Only 3 non premature or non cesarean infants (14.3%) died after non combined vaccination.Conclusion:Most of deaths were contributed by combined vaccination of vaccination or cesarean or premature infants. The study suggested that the instructions of HBV should be revised as soon as possible to reduce the occurrence rate of paradoxical reaction. Science communication of vaccination risk should be improved. |
