Starting next year, the chickenpox vaccine will be offered as part of the general vaccination program in Sweden. It will be free for all children who have not already had chickenpo…

Starting next year, the chickenpox vaccine will be offered as part of the general vaccination program in Sweden. It will be free for all children who have not already had chickenpox. The vaccine will be offered in two doses, the first at 18 months of age via Sweden's child health centres (Barnavårdscentralen, often called BVC), and the second when the child is 7–8 years old via school student health programmes. "All children should receive this protection. It feels urgent, because it is a rather prolonged, painful disease. And for the parents it means a lot of trouble," said Minister of Social Affairs Jakob Forssmed of the Christian Democrats. Chickenpox is a common, highly contagious disease that can sometimes cause serious illness. Chickenpox is most common in preschool children. The disease begins with fever and body aches that last for a few days. This is followed by itchy blisters on the body - usually first on the trunk, later on the face, scalp and oral cavity. After recovering from chickenpox, the virus remains in the body's nerve cells (regardless of whether the person had the disease with or without symptoms) and can be reactivated later in life, causing shingles, among other things. Chickenpox also carries a risk of infection in the blisters that form on the skin, which may require antibiotic treatment. "If we can avoid it, then we can also reduce antibiotic resistance. So this is positive in many ways," said Forssmed.