The real-life number of neonatal doses of Bacille Calmette-Guérin vaccine in a 20-dose vial

Abstract

In real life, experienced nurses could only obtain 13-15 doses from the 20-dose vials. Thus, vaccine wastage is much lower than assumed. Adjusting practice to the real-life number of doses would immediately suggest vials should be opened if 7 rather than 10 infants are present. As other studies have indicated that BCG may have beneficial non-specific effects on overall mortality, the potential gain by opening a 20-dose vial even for one child may be considerable.