Introduction:

Coverage of children vaccination programs is associated with the survival probability of infants and it is a measure of the performance of national immunization systems.

Objective:

To characterize children vaccination programs in Latin American countries from infants survival during 2000-2015.

Methods:

A retrospective descriptive study of the immunization program in 21 Latin American countries was carried out based in the methodology of the data envelopment analysis with time windows. The associated variables were: vaccines (Bacillus Calmette-Guérin, diphtheria, Bordetella pertussis and tetanus, measles, polio) and survival rate (under 1 year, under 5 years). The information was taken from the reports of the World Health Organization.

Results:

During the studied period (2000-2015), the efficiency of vaccination programs varied between 77 % and 99 %, and the inefficiency was in the range from 1 % to 23 %. The result showed the identification of four groups of countries with a correct classification of 95,2 %.

Conclusions:

In Latin America, children’s vaccination programs present different behaviors in each country. The group formed by Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Mexico and Uruguay are the reference in children vaccination programs, due to the rate of vaccination coverage and the survival rates in children under 5 years. In accordance to the efficiency results, this group would have equal survival rates with less rate of coverage.

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