Economic evaluation of pneumococcal conjugate vaccination in Finland.

The aim of this study was to evaluate cost-effectiveness of pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV7) in children <5 y of age. A Markov simulation model was used to compare the cost-effectiveness of 4 doses (assumed 50.5 euros per dose) of PCV7 with no intervention. Only direct effects of the vaccine were taken into account. In Finland, vaccination of a birth cohort of 57,500 healthy infants would potentially prevent annually 60 cases of invasive PD, 1,400 cases of pneumococcal pneumonia, 15,000 episodes of acute otitis media, 3,000 otological surgery procedures and 0.9 deaths in children aged <5 y. Investing 12.0 million euros to vaccinate a birth cohort would save annually 6.3 million euros in medical, and 2.0 million euros in productivity and other, costs. Therefore, investing 1 euros in a vaccination programme would return 0.53 euros in medical costs and 0.70 euros in societal costs. In the base case, vaccination would cost society 139,986 euros per life y gained. To achieve cost savings from a health care provider (societal) perspective, without considering herd effects or replacement phenomenon, the price of PCV7 should be 50% (70%) of the price used in the base case.