Bay doctors are hopeful a funded vaccine for chickenpox is close with parents currently forced to pay up to $95 to partially protect their child from the disease.
The Varicella vaccine, which requires two of the costly injections to provide full immunity, has been funded in Australia for 10 years.
In New Zealand, Pharmac's Dr John Wyeth said the organisation's Pharmacology and Therapeutics Advisory Committee Immunisation sub-committee this year recommended funding Varicella.
"This means that universal Varicella vaccination has been considered and is now ranked against all of our other options for pharmaceutical investments," Dr Wyeth said.
Tauranga medical officer of health Dr Phil Shoemack said the Rotavirus vaccine, which prevents cases of severe diarrhoea, became funded last year and he understood Varicella had been considered at the same time.
"It was a financial decision really," he said.
Dr Shoemack said adding Varicella to the immunisation schedule would have immediate results.
"We'll see a dramatic decrease, almost overnight, in chicken pox," he said.
While he had not heard of any cases of children dying from chicken pox in the Western Bay, it was a possibility.
"It does happen. It's well documented that you can get a severe infection from chicken pox," he said.
The severity of the disease varied widely, he said.
"It's definitely going to result in some pain and suffering. It's not possible to predict which child's going to get a mild infection."
Children with chicken pox needed to be isolated for 10 to 14 days, post infection, meaning parents also needed to take time off work to care for them, Dr Shoemack said.
Chicken pox is not a notifiable disease in New Zealand.
However, Dr Shoemack did receive calls from schools and daycares seeking advice on how to prevent and contain an outbreak of the disease.
Mount Medical GP James Peckett said he had seen 15 to 20 cases of chicken pox in the last six weeks, one of them requiring antibiotics for infection.
Dr Peckett said he recommended parents who could afford it got their children vaccinated, as well as those adults who did not have a clear history of the disease.
The effects of chicken pox could range from mild to severe and if vaccination could prevent a disease in a child, it was ideal, he said.
Working in a hospital environment he had seen children "very unwell" with chickenpox leading to skin infections, pneumonia and inflammation of the brain.
He welcomed Varicella becoming part of the national immunisation schedule.
"Hopefully it will be a disease of the past soon."
From July 2014 Varicella became funded for New Zealanders considered to be at risk of serious disease (such as those with weakened immune systems) and their immediate families and caregivers if they had never been exposed to chickenpox.
In Australia, all children are given the measles, mumps, rubella and Varicella (MMRV) vaccine at 18 months and a second dose of Varicella at school between the ages of 10 and 15.
New Zealand Immunisation Advisory Centre director Dr Nikki Turner said it was likely the MMR and Varicella vaccinations would be given separately in New Zealand, because of the increased risk of fever which came from combining the two.
It was likely a single vaccine would be given at 15-months and the incidence of the disease in the community monitored before a second funded dose was considered.