The government says that since then, the number of Americans sent to hospitals by the infection each year has dropped by more than two-thirds.
Past studies have shown since the vaccine became standard, yearly rates of chicken pox infections in the U.S. fell by 80 percent to 90 percent over the next decade.
While most cases of chicken pox simply make people miserable, some people do develop potentially serious complications.
The latest study by the CDC found that overall hospitalizations fell by 71 percent over the study period between 2000 and 2006.
