Lifesavers · No. 18
The tetanus vaccine
Vaccinating mothers against tetanus, together with clean birth practices, cut deaths of newborns from tetanus by about 84% in two decades.
A share of the decline in annual newborn tetanus deaths, not a cumulative lives-saved total.
How it saves lives
Tetanus is not contagious; it comes from spores in soil and dirt that enter through wounds, including the cut umbilical cord of a newborn delivered in unclean conditions. Because there is no herd immunity to hide behind, protection has to be individual. Vaccinating a pregnant woman passes antibodies to her baby that guard it through its first, most vulnerable weeks, and clean delivery removes the spores' way in. Together they have made a once-common newborn death rare.
The story
Neonatal tetanus is a terrible way to die: a newborn, apparently healthy at birth, stiffens and convulses in the second week of life, unable to feed. For most of history it was common wherever babies were born in unclean conditions. A vaccine for pregnant mothers, paired with clean-delivery campaigns, changed that. The World Health Organization estimates that newborn deaths from tetanus fell by about 84% between 2000 and 2021, from an estimated 46,898 a year to just over 7,700. It is a quiet victory, because the deaths it prevents simply never appear.
From the record
In 2021, just over 7700 newborns died from neonatal tetanus, a 84% reduction since 2000, when an estimated 46 898 newborn babies died of tetanus within their first month of life.
Asked often
How many lives has the tetanus vaccine saved?
There is no single cumulative total, but the effect is clear in newborns: the World Health Organization reports that deaths from neonatal tetanus fell by about 84% between 2000 and 2021, from an estimated 46 898 a year to just over 7700, as maternal vaccination and clean delivery spread.
Why do mothers get the tetanus vaccine during pregnancy?
Vaccinating the mother passes protective antibodies to the baby, guarding it against tetanus in its first weeks of life, when a newborn is most at risk from an infected umbilical cord. It also protects the mother during and after childbirth.
The next one is being invented now.
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