Immunization & Vaccines

Immunization is a proven public health measure that helps to prevent, reduce and eliminate serious and life-threatening impacts of many communicable diseases.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Immunizations are a critical part of keeping babies, children, and adults healthy and have been extremely effective at reducing illness, disease and their complications for many decades.

Vaccines teach the immune system how to recognize and fight off disease-causing germs before you come into contact with them. They help protect against disease without the risk of getting sick.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​Key things to know about immunization

Vaccines are very effective at preventing disease, especially severe disease

  • The World Health Organization​ estimates that 3.5 to 5 million deaths are prevented each year by current immunization programs.
  • The Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) credits immunization as saving more lives in the last 50 years than any other health measure.
  • Vaccines can prevent disease or reduce the severity of disease even if you do get sick. 
  • Vaccines are so effective that smallpox has been eradicated, and polio has been eliminated in most parts of the world. Many other communicable diseases, such as diphtheria, rubella, and mumps, have become very rare because of vaccination.
  • Diseases that become rare because of effective immunization programs can return when immunization rates fall. There is significant measles transmission in many parts of the world including in Canada, with most cases occurring in people who were unimmunized or under immunized.​

​Vaccines are much safer than getting the disease

  • ​Vaccines provide the best protection against vaccine-preventable diseases and their complications. Unimmunized people who get infected with a vaccine-preventable disease can experience severe symptoms and get very sick, including needing to be hospitalized or even dying.

Getting immunized helps protect others, especially those at higher risk​

  • ​​The more people are immunized in a community, the harder it is for a disease to spread, creating ‘community immunity’. Achieving and maintaining a high level of immunization coverage in a population is important for protecting everyone. 
  • Community immunity can be especially helpful in protecting people who are at higher risk of severe infection. This includes people who are very young, the elderly, those with weakened immune systems, and those who cannot get immunized for medical reasons.

BC’s immunization schedule

Immunization schedules recommend which vaccines to get and when. They are based on the best available science on vaccines and the diseases they prevent.

​​Key factors for determining immunization schedules

  • How often disease occurs in different places 
  • How often disease occurs in different groups of people
  • How severe disease can be in different groups of people
  • How much protection vaccines give, and for how long
  • Potential side effects of vaccines
Find BC's immunization schedules​​

Childhood immunization schedule

Adult immunizations

​There are many recommended vaccines for adults. These include vaccines against influenza, pneumococcal disease, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), shingles, and more.​

Some people have medical conditions such as a weakened immune system that make it even more important to receive certain vaccines.

How vaccines schedules are developed in BC

​In Canada, the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI)​ reviews all available scientific evidence about how well vaccines work (effectiveness) and how safe they are. NACI then makes recommendations on how vaccines should be used. The committee is made up of experts in fields like pediatrics, infectious diseases, and public health and follows strict conflict-of-interest rules.

Each province and territory in Canada is responsible for developing its own immunization schedules of publicly funded vaccines, meaning they are available at no cost to people living in that region. Provinces and territories, including BC, use NACI’s recommendations, along with other information such as local data on how often certain diseases occur, to create immunization schedules for children and adults. Differences in provincial or territorial funding decisions may mean that some vaccines recommended by NACI may be available at no cost in some jurisdictions but not in others. These vaccines are still recommended and are often available for purchase.

Immunization schedules can vary between provinces, territories, and countries. There are many reasons for these differences, such as how likely it is for a person to be exposed to or to get very sick from a vaccine-preventable disease. Differences in access to health care can also play a role in a person’s risk of vaccine-preventable diseases.​

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How vaccines work ​

Vaccines teach the immune system how to recognize and fight off infections. Vaccines contain killed, weakened or synthetically manufactured versions of the disease-causing germ or parts of the germ called antigens. Some vaccines contain instructions for producing antigens rather than the antigen itself. When a person gets a vaccine, the immune system responds to the antigen as if it were exposed to the actual germ (it makes antibodies and remembers how to defeat it). Then, if the body gets exposed to the germ in the future, the immune system can recognize it right away and quickly fight it off to prevent disease. 

While immunity can be achieved through infection from a germ, this comes at the risk of serious illness, hospitalization, and even death.  

While most vaccines are highly effective in preventing disease, no vaccine is 100% effective. Not all people get full protection after immunization. But those who get a disease after being immunized are less likely to become seriously ill.​

Combination vaccines

​‎Some vaccines can protect against more than one disease. These are known as combination vaccines. The measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine is an example of a combination vaccine that protects against three diseases. Combination vaccines are subject to the same rigorous testing and are safe, effective, and convenient as they reduce the number of injections a person needs. ​

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Vaccine safety

Vaccines used in Canada are very safe. The most common side effects are mild and go away after a few days. Vaccines are among the safest medical products available.

Before any vaccine is approved for use by Health Canada​, it must go through in-depth testing and reviews to prove it works and that it is safe. 

After vaccines are approved and used in the population, they continue to be monitored for very rare safety events and effectiveness.


Immunization resources​

Talk to a health care provider

​​Talk to your health care provider about vaccine preventable diseases and their risks. Find out if you or your child needs to bring any immunizations up to date.

  • ​If your child is school age, keep an eye out for information from their school about scheduled immunization clinics, and fill out the consent forms to sign them up.

  • Adults, including young adults in college or university, are also encouraged to make sure they’re up to date on their immunizations.​

Immunization records

Find out if you or your child need to get up to date on any immunizations. It is important to have a complete immunization record including any vaccines you may have received in another country, province or territory. 

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HealthLink BC

Find evidence-based immunization information and tools. HeatlhLink BC provides information on: 
  • ​Vaccine-preventable diseases
  • What vaccines are and how they work
  • The safety of vaccines
  • Recommended vaccines
  • Immunization schedules
  • Immunization record cards 

Immunization education activities

  • I Boost Immunity offers a series of fun online quizzes to boost vaccine confidence. For each correctly completed quiz, a vaccine is donated to UNICEF Canada to help protect children globally.
  • Kids Boost Immunity​ offers free curated lessons and interactive quizzes for schools that align with the province’s science, health, and social studies curriculums.