Pneumococcal vaccines provide immunisation against infection with specific serotypes of Streptococcus pneumoniae. S. pneumoniae causes a range of infections, from mild and often-self limiting conditions such as sinusitis and otitis media, to potentially life-threatening ones such as pneumonia, meningitis, and septicaemia. Pneumococcal vaccination programmes appear to have significantly reduced the incidence of invasive pneumococcal infections, both by preventing infection in vaccine recipients, and indirectly protecting unvaccinated individuals by way of reducing S. pneumoniae carriage and circulation.1
This is a companion discussion topic for the original article at https://patient.info/doctor/pneumococcal-vaccination