The impact of immunization against COVID-19 in Ribeirão Preto-SP

• DOI: 10.22533/at.ed.1593952316113

• Palavras-chave: COVID-19; Vaccination; Ribeirão Preto

• Keywords: COVID-19; Vaccination; Ribeirão Preto

• Abstract:

  In December 2019 in Wuhan, China, a new type of coronavirus emerged, named by the World Health Organization as SARS-CoV-2, causing the disease COVID-19. In a short time, this virus spread and caused the biggest pandemic of the 21st century. Due to this pandemic scenario, numerous researches were carried out on SARS-CoV-2, concluding that this virus is an enveloped RNA virus with a genome consisting of a single-stranded positive-sense RNA molecule. Work was carried out on the development of vaccines against COVID-19, with the Coronavac, AstraZeneca/Oxford, Pfizer/Biontech and Janssen vaccines being approved in Brazil. However, a portion of the population questions how these vaccines work and whether there really are more benefits than harm to their application. This article aims to analyze the impact of vaccination coverage against COVID-19 on the number of infected people, hospitalizations and deaths due to SARS-CoV-2 in the population of Ribeirão Preto-SP, in order to verify whether there has been a reduction in these variants. This article is an ecological study and to carry it out data from epidemiological bulletins available at the Municipal Health Department of the city of Ribeirão Preto were used, which contained information on the variants analyzed and on vaccination coverage. Epidemiological bulletins from January 2020 to July 2022 were analyzed. The study showed that at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic the disease had a high death rate, with the average in 2020 and 2021 being 2.5% and 2.7%, respectively, while in 2022 this rate was 0.7%. Regarding hospitalization, in 2020 the highest rate was 23.7%, and in 2022 the highest rate was 1.7%. Comparing data in the period before and after vaccination of the population, it is noted that immunization against COVID-19 contributed to reducing hospitalization and death rates, being effective in individual and collective health. However, vaccination did not show any effect on reducing the transmissibility of the virus.