ABSTRACT
In the western world vaccination has been widely used for over 200 years, ever since the pivotal work of Edward Jenner, who is widely accredited with the introduction of this procedure following his demonstration that vaccinia virus can be used to protect against human smallpox. It is little known that similar experiments were conducted some 20 years before those of Jenner by the Dorset farmer Benjamin Jesty. In companion animal medicine, vaccination has been most widely employed in the past four decades, although in the majority of western countries there is only a moderate uptake of pet vaccination (approximately 30-50% of the target population). The nature of the vaccines that are currently administered to animals has not changed dramatically over this time. Although occasional new products are introduced in response to newly arising infectious diseases (e.g. canine parvovirus, FeLV, FIV), current vaccine technology (with some exceptions) is firmly rooted in the 1960s. This chapter will review the fundamentals of vaccinol ogy, the types of veterinary vaccine, the regulatory means by which vaccines are licensed for use, and current vaccine guidelines that have arisen from debate over the adverse consequences of vaccination.
