No prevention strategy for cardiovascular disease is complete without immunisation
September 15, 2025
Vaccines Europe’s response to the call for evidence on the EU cardiovascular health plan
In Europe, there are 62 million people living with cardiovascular diseases (CVD) [1] and 5,000 deaths due to CVD every day [2]. To tackle this serious health threat successfully, the EU Cardiovascular Health Plan must incorporate immunisation as a foundational pillar of cardiovascular prevention.
People with CVD are particularly vulnerable to severe complications from respiratory infections such as influenza, COVID-19, RSV, and pneumococcal. For example, flu increases the risk of a heart attack sixfold in people with CVD [3]. Vaccination has been shown to effectively reduce the severity of complications and CVD-related deaths [4]. However, despite the strong evidence, immunisation is still critically underused as a prevention strategy for people living with CVD. It also remains underfunded, with 77% of EU countries spending less than 0.5% of their health budgets on immunisation programmes [5].
To achieve its ambition, the Cardiovascular Health Plan must:
- Incorporate immunisation as a core prevention measure as highlighted in the recently published ESC Clinical Consensus Statement [6];
- Bolster investment in immunisation to reduce the most harmful consequences of CVD in Europe;
- Include a flagship EU initiative on prevention of respiratory infections to reduce the health and economic burden of CVD, help address inequalities, and support EU countries in achieving their Sustainable Development Goals;
- Update vaccination coverage targets against respiratory infections for Member States and strengthen electronic immunisation records to monitor and improve uptake.
Embedding vaccination into the EU Cardiovascular Health Plan will save lives and build a more resilient healthcare ecosystem for the future.
Read our submission to the consultation here.
[1] https://health.ec.europa.eu/document/download/e20d320b-1a5b-4a9a-8de5-072e8c75e59f_en?filename=ncd_20240320_poster05_en.pdf
[2] https://ehnheart.org/about-cvd/eu-action-on-cvd/
[3] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1702090
[5] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14760584.2021.1905257
