Immunizations

The Erie County Department of Health provides immunizations to children, adolescents, and adults.

  • To know your eligibility and to make an appointment, call 814-451-6777
  • Available to people of any age who don’t have insurance
  • Parents or guardians over the age of 18 years must accompany children under 18 years to an appointment
  • Previous Immunization Records must be brought to the appointment. Always keep an up-to-date record of your immunizations

Immunizations are provided to prevent the following diseases:

  • Chicken pox (Varicella)
  • Measles, mumps and rubella (MMR)
  • Diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis (DTap, Td, Tdap)
  • Hepatitis (A and B)
  • Haemophilus type B (Hib)
  • Human papilloma virus (HPV)
  • Influenza (seasonal)
  • Meningitis (meningococcal)
  • Pneumonia (pneumococcal, Prevnar)
  • Polio (IPV)
  • Shingles

Recommended Immunizations

For Infants

Infants and young children are often at higher risk of serious problems if they get a vaccine-preventable disease. Make sure they get all their immunizations on time, every time.

For Children

Children in child care and school may be exposed to diseases. It is important for their immunizations to be up to date. It’s not too late to catch up. If your child missed any immunizations recommended at younger ages, be sure to catch up now.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health requires certain immunizations for attendance at schools in the state.

For Teens

Teens and young adults should catch up on all missed immunizations to protect themselves and others against disease. In addition to a yearly flu shot, teens should get three vaccines to protect against serious and preventable disease.

Pennsylvania’s immunization requirements for school attendance continue into the teen years.

For Adults

The specific vaccines needed by adults are determined by age, lifestyle, risk conditions, locations of travel and previous vaccines.

The need for immunizations doesn’t end with childhood. Each year, thousands of adults in the U. S. suffer serious health problems, are hospitalized, or even die from diseases that could be prevented by vaccines, including influenza, whooping cough, certain bacterial infections, hepatitis A and B, shingles and even some cancers such as cervical cancer and liver cancer.

Protection from some childhood immunizations wears off over time, leaving you vulnerable to disease.  For example, there has been a rise in cases of whooping cough in the past few years, with more than 48,000 cases being reported in 2012.  We have learned that the protection from DTaP whooping cough vaccine given to children doesn’t last into adulthood, so all adults are now recommended to get one dose of Tdap whooping cough vaccine if they did not receive it as an adolescent.

Adults may be recommended for certain vaccines due to their age, job, hobbies, travel or health condition.  Other vaccines may be recommended if they didn’t get certain vaccines as children.

Some adults, including older adults and those who have chronic health conditions, may be at higher risk for serious complications from some vaccine-preventable diseases. For example, because older age increases the chance of getting shingles, CDC recommends that adults get the shingles vaccine once they turn 60 years old.  People with diabetes, heart disease and COPD or asthma, even if well managed, are more likely than those without these conditions to have complications from the flu.  To prevent possible complications like pneumonia, people with these chronic conditions should get a pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine in addition to a yearly flu vaccine.

Adult immunization also helps prevent the spread of certain diseases to loved ones and those in the community who are most vulnerable to disease (like infants and those with weakened immune systems).

Talk with your doctor to find out which vaccines are right for you.

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