You probably know why measles cases are rising again, don’t you?
The usual suspects, right?
Why Are Measles Cases Rising?
While the answer is low immunization rates, you can’t pin all of the blame on vaccine hesitancy, the Wakefield effect, Bob Sears, and Jenny McCarthy, etc., can you?
After all, we had been seeing a decline in measles cases and deaths for many years, so why the surge in recent years?
It’s certainly not because the MMR is a leaky vaccine, as Robert F. Kennedy, Jr likes to claim.
It is also not because of deadly new rogue strains of measles that have mutated and have been “spreading like wildfire” and causing worldwide outbreaks because the MMR doesn’t cover them, another of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr‘s anti-vaccine theories…
So what is behind the rise in cases of measles?
“In all WHO regions, the fundamental cause of the resurgence was a failure to vaccinate, both in recent and past years, causing immunity gaps in both younger and some older age groups.”
Progress Toward Regional Measles Elimination — Worldwide, 2000–2019
Many have described it as a perfect storm of conditions for measles outbreaks – an increase in those who didn’t have access to vaccines combined with an increased number of folks who simply didn’t want to vaccinate and protect themselves or their kids. The presence of natural disasters, political issues, and wars in many countries didn’t help either!
For example, among the several large outbreaks in 2019, we saw:
- Very big outbreaks occurred in DRC (310,000 cases and 6,000 deaths) and Madagascar (244,607 cases and 1,080 deaths in an outbreak that started in 2018) as large numbers of measles-susceptible children had built up secondary to longstanding extremely low measles vaccine coverage, no introduction of a second dose of the measles vaccine into their immunization program, and suboptimal supplementary immunization activity implementation to control outbreaks.
- An outbreak in Ukraine (57,282 cases and 16 deaths) that “was the result of low vaccine confidence among health care professionals, low demand from the public, and challenges with vaccine supply, storage, and handling.”
- An outbreak in the Philippines from low immunization rates (47,871 cases and 632 deaths) which was triggered by controversy surrounding a new Dengue vaccine.
- Nigeria‘s outbreak (28,094 cases) was triggered by low immunization rates, overstretched health services, and conflict.
- An outbreak in Brazil (20,901 cases) that was caused by low vaccination rates and importations from the outbreak in neighboring Venezuela.
- That India had a high number of measles cases (10,430) in the world in 2019 triggered by low immunization rates.
- An outbreak in Samoa that resulted from a steady decline in measles vaccine coverage, made worse by a decline in vaccine confidence after two infants died after a nurse mixed MMR vaccine powder with expired muscle relaxant anaesthetic instead of water for injection supplied in a vial with the vaccine.
- That Ethiopia saw nearly 4000 cases where measles is still endemic and children didn’t start to get a second dose of measles containing vaccine until 2019.
- That Pakistan had a really big outbreak in 2018.
And then travel of susceptible folks to and from these countries to communities with intentionally low vaccination rates created other large outbreaks.
But it is not until you understand that nearly 20 million infants didn’t get a measles vaccine in 2019 that it should become really clear why we saw such large outbreaks.
“In 2019, 42 (22%) countries achieved MCV1 coverage ≥90% nationally and ≥80% in all districts; however, during that year 19.8 million infants did not receive MCV1 through routine immunization services. The six countries with the highest numbers of infants who had not received MCV1 were Nigeria (3.3 million), Ethiopia (1.5 million), Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) (1.4 million), Pakistan (1.4 million), India (1.2 million), and Philippines (0.7 million), accounting for nearly half (48%) of the world’s total.”
Progress Toward Regional Measles Elimination — Worldwide, 2000–2019
And not surprisingly, those were the countries that saw really big outbreaks.
“The ground for the global measles outbreaks we are witnessing today was laid years ago. The measles virus will always find unvaccinated children. If we are serious about averting the spread of this dangerous but preventable disease, we need to vaccinate every child, in rich and poor countries alike.”
Henrietta Fore, UNICEF Executive Director.
And a lot of deaths from measles!
Where Are Measles Cases Rising?
Which countries, states, and communities will see big outbreaks over the next few years?
Which countries, states, and communities aren’t going to get their kids vaccinated and protected?
When will parents realize that free-riding, or trying to hide in the herd, is the equivalent of trying to camp out in the eye of a hurricane? Tragically, it likely won’t be until more and more people are unvaccinated, and that eye gets smaller and smaller and the storm around them grows and gets stronger and eventually reaches them!
More on Why Measles Cases are Rising
- What to Do If Your Child Is Exposed to Measles
- Remembering When Everyone Had Measles
- Fact Checking the Idea That Measles Was Never a Scary Disease
- Fun and Games with Measles?
- Why Are You Still Worried About the MMR Vaccine?
- Why Have We Forgotten About the Importance of Vaccination Against Measles?
- The Myth That Measles Isn’t Deadly
- Remembering Measles
- WHO – Worldwide measles deaths climb 50% from 2016 to 2019 claiming over 207 500 lives in 2019
- CDC – Progress Toward Regional Measles Elimination — Worldwide, 2000–2019
- CDC – Routine Vaccination Coverage — Worldwide, 2019
- UNICEF and WHO warn of perfect storm of conditions for measles outbreaks, affecting children
- Measles outbreaks continue unabated : Five countries accounted for nearly half of all measles cases in 2018
- Vaccine confidence plummets in the Philippines following dengue vaccine scare: why it matters to pandemic preparedness
- Over 20 million children worldwide missed out on measles vaccine annually in past 8 years, creating a pathway to current global outbreaks
- An anatomy of an outbreak: Measles hits urban India
Last Updated on April 16, 2024