What Does vaccine Mean
The term vaccine has different uses and applications. On the one hand, it refers to what belongs to or related to cattle , that is, cows . For example: "This jacket has been made with the best cow leather" , "Agricultural activity suffers from the fall in the price of cattle, which has reached its minimum level in fifteen years" .
On the other hand, a vaccine is an organic principle or a virus that, prepared in a certain way, is inoculated into a person or an animal to protect it against a specific disease .
A vaccine is a preparation of antigens , which is a substance that allows the formation of antibodies and has the ability to generate an immune response within the body. This attack response allows the development of an immunological memory that produces, in general, permanent immunity against the disease.
Any human being needs certain vaccines to avoid being infected with diseases or pathologies of various kinds, however, the people who most require them are newborns. Thus, it is usual that in the first months of life they have to be subjected to vaccine injections to avoid being infected with measles, meningitis, mumps or poliomyelitis, among other problems.
In the same way, it is necessary to underline the fact that on many occasions when traveling to certain areas of the globe it is necessary and essential to carry out a certain vaccination to avoid being infected and infected with diseases that are the order of the day. in those places.
Thus, for example, any Spanish citizen who makes the decision to travel to South Africa will find it necessary to be vaccinated against yellow fever and against malaria. Meanwhile, if the destination is to Thailand, where you are going to practice sports or where you are going to reside in rural areas, it is recommended that travelers get vaccinated against malaria and that they also bet on tetanus and anti-rabies vaccines.
The first vaccine in history would have been created by the English country doctor Edward Jenner in 1796 , who discovered that cowpox immunized people from suffering from human smallpox , much more serious and deadly.
Over time, various vaccines emerged to counteract diseases such as rabies (1882), plague (1897), tuberculosis (1927), yellow fever (1935), influenza (1945), measles (1964), rubella (1970), chickenpox (1974), meningitis (1978) and hepatitis A (1992), among many others.
All this without overlooking the fact that among the most recent vaccines, those of the 21st century, are the human papillomavirus that appeared in 2005, a first vaccine to end the addiction to cocaine and heroin that occurred to be known in 2008 and finally in 2009 the first vaccine against the famous Influenza A appeared.
Vaccines can be inactivated (formed by harmful microorganisms that, treated with chemicals or heat, lose their damage capacity), live attenuated (microorganisms grown under conditions that make them lose their harmful properties), toxoids (inactivated toxic components from microorganisms) and subunits (fragments of microorganisms).