- New research suggests the shingles vaccine may lower the risk of dementia.
- This isn’t the first study to link the vaccine with a lowered risk of the disease.
- Doctors say this underscores the importance of getting the vaccine.
There are a slew of older adult vaccines that healthcare professionals recommend getting as you age. But there’s one in particular that seems to have health benefits beyond lowering the risk of getting the illness it’s designed to prevent. Recent research found that the shingles vaccine may lower your risk of dementia.
A new scientific analysis published in Nature Medicine delves into the science. For the analysis, researchers looked at the healthcare records of more than 100 million patients across more than 7,000 hospitals and clinics in the U.S. between 2007 and 2023.
Researchers zeroed in on those who received the shingles vaccine and found that those who got it had a 33% lower risk of dementia compared with people who got the pneumococcal vaccine, which doesn’t protect against shingles but is recommended for people in the same age group. Because people who are healthy are more likely to get vaccinated, the pneumococcal vaccine was designed to be a “control.”
Meet the experts: Amesh A. Adalja, M.D., is a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security; Thomas Russo, M.D., is a professor and chief of infectious diseases at the University at Buffalo in New York
People who got the recombinant zoster vaccine, which is the shingles vaccine with an agent that’s designed to produce a stronger immune response, had a 27% lower risk of developing dementia.
The researchers also discovered that people who got shingles more than once had a higher risk of dementia, especially within the decade after their second shingles episode.
The researchers stopped short of saying that people should get the shingles vaccine to prevent dementia, pointing out that randomized clinical trials are needed first. But they did say that there’s a possibility that lowering your risk of having the reactivation of the varicella zoster virus—which causes chickenpox and shingles—may also delay a person’s progression to dementia.
“Our findings strongly implicate varicella zoster virus reactivation as a modifiable risk factor for dementia,” the researchers wrote in the conclusion.
Shingles and dementia are two completely different diseases, making it natural to wonder how the shingles vaccine may lower the risk of dementia. Here’s what doctors want you to know.
Why is the shingles vaccine linked to a lower risk of dementia?
There are a few possible things at play here. “The vaccine likely has an impact by reducing brain inflammation that can be linked to dementia,” says Amesh A. Adalja, M.D., a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
The zoster virus tends to target blood vessels, explains Thomas Russo, M.D., a professor and chief of infectious diseases at the University at Buffalo in New York. “It can cause inflammation in blood vessels, large and small,” he says. Because there are many blood vessels in the brain, the virus may spark inflammation in the brain, which the vaccine could help prevent, he says. “It has been postulated that the vaccine itself has modulatory effects on inflammation,” Dr. Russo says.
It’s important to point out that this isn’t the first time that the shingles vaccine has been linked to a lower risk of developing dementia. In April, an analysis of the health records of 280,000 people published in Nature found that those who received the shingles vaccine were 20% less likely to develop dementia over the next seven years than those who didn’t get the vaccine.
A 2024 Nature Medicine study found that people who received Shingrix (a shingles vaccine that has something added to it—adjuvant—to trigger a more robust immune response) were at least 17% less likely to be diagnosed with dementia within six years than those who didn’t receive it.
“There is a large body of data now that shows this vaccine protects against dementia, and potentially against strokes and cardiovascular disease as well,” Dr. Russo says.
Should I get the shingles vaccine?
The shingles vaccine, which is given in two doses, is more than 90% effective at preventing shingles, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The CDC recommends getting the shingles vaccine when you turn 50, with the doses separated by two to six months. If you’re 19 years old or older and have a weakened immune system, the CDC also suggests getting the vaccine.
The bottom line
Doctors say this study only underscores the value of the shingles vaccine. “Shingles is a painful illness that can lead to debilitating pain,” Dr. Adalja says. “This is another study adding more data to the benefits of the shingles vaccine, moving beyond just prevention of shingles, which in itself is valuable.”
Dr. Russo agrees. “This is an extraordinarily beneficial vaccine at multiple levels,” he says. “It’s good not only at preventing zoster, which is uncomfortable and can have long-term health effects, but it’s almost certain you will get the benefits of decreasing the likelihood of developing dementia.”
Read the full article here