Vaccination as cost-stabilizing health infrastructure: A Canadian perspective

As Canada contends with rising healthcare costs and health system strain, vaccination programs stand out as stabilizing health infrastructure. Vaccination can reduce the burden of avoidable illness and dampen volatility arising from seasonal disease surges and outbreaks. Together, these effects can preserve clinical and public health capacity, improve fiscal predictability, and support health system resilience. These system-level benefits are generally not fully captured by conventional cost-utility analyses. Drawing on Canadian evidence, we outline how vaccination programs stabilize healthcare use and spending, and how a stabilization lens complements conventional economic evaluation. Recognizing vaccines as cost-stabilizing infrastructure may influence how vaccination programs are prioritized, budgeted, and evaluated in health system planning.