For the vast majority of vaccines, vaccination offers two levels of protection: individual and collective.
The individual level involves inducing protection in the vaccinated person by triggering a specific immune response against the relevant infectious agent. Beyond protecting themselves, vaccinated individuals will, in most cases, also help protect others. Indeed, vaccination prevents the pathogen from multiplying in the vaccinated individual. A vaccinated person is therefore no longer likely to transmit the virus or bacteria to those around them, thereby preventing their loved ones—and particularly those who are unvaccinated—from becoming infected, developing the disease, and spreading the virus or bacteria to the general population. The vaccinated person acts, vis-à-vis the rest of the population, as a barrier against the pathogen, breaking the chain of transmission. The more the population is vaccinated, the more the circulation of the bacteria or virus in question is reduced.
That is why. Vaccines are medicines of paramount importance for everyone’s health, as they help prevent a vast number of diseases and epidemics. Vaccination represents one of the greatest successes in public health: according to the World Health Organization (WHO), 2 to 3 million lives are saved each year thanks to this simple preventive measure.

Thanks to vaccination, smallpox has been eradicated worldwide, and polio has been eliminated from Europe and nearly every country in the world. Several million people are vaccinated each year in France. Getting vaccinated according to the vaccination schedule is currently the most effective preventive measure against many serious infectious diseases that are difficult to treat and/or carry a risk of complications and long-term effects, such as tetanus, mumps, whooping cough, measles, meningococcal meningitis and septicemia, and many others…