A new study has found that chickenpox vaccine can also lower the risk for shingles in humans.
Shingles is a viral infection that causes a painful rash. It often appears as a single stripe of blisters that wraps around either the left or the right side of the torso. However, it can happen anywhere on the body.
Pain is usually the first symptom of shingles. Other symptoms may include rashes, blisters and itching.
Shingles and Chickenpox
Shingles is caused by the varicella-zoster virus — the same virus that causes chickenpox. After one has had chickenpox, the virus lies inactive in the nerve tissue near the spinal cord and brain. Years later, the virus may reactivate as shingles.
The Study
The researchers studied 6.4 million children under 18, half of whom had the chickenpox vaccine. This study calculated results from 2003 to 2014.
At the end of the research, they found that the children who were vaccinated with the chickenpox vaccine had 78 percent lower rates of shingles than the children who were not vaccinated.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends two doses of the vaccine, at age 1 year and then between 4 and 6.
Among children who had both doses, rates of shingles were even lower.
According to a report by The New York Times, Sheila Weinmann, an epidemiologist at the Kaiser Permanente Northwest Center for Health Research in Portland, Ore, the number of children suffering from chickenpox decreased, despite of the fact that they were vaccinated or not.
She also said that the parents would find the fact very interesting that vaccine can not only protect against chickenpox but also shingles.
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