Measles deaths increased by 43 percent worldwide from 95,000 in 2021 to 136,200 in 2022. The total number of people with measles increased from 7.8 million in 2021 to 9.2 million in 2022. The number of ‘major or disruptive outbreaks’ increased from 22 in 2021 to 37 in 2022.
“The increase in measles outbreaks and deaths is staggering,” the CDC said in a statement. “But unfortunately not unexpected given the declining vaccination rates we have seen in recent years.” The CDC says that “urgent and targeted efforts are critical to prevent measles deaths.”
The WHO and UNICEF keep track of the number of vaccinations against measles administered worldwide. This concerns a BRM vaccination, which protects against measles, mumps and rubella (as rubella is also called). One dose of the MMR vaccine protects 93 percent against measles, two doses protect 97 percent.
According to the CDC, vaccination rates for both the first and second doses must be 95 percent to protect communities from outbreaks.
Low vaccination rates in developing countries
Particularly in low-income countries, the vaccination rate has fallen sharply between 2019 and 2021, from 71 percent to 67 percent. In 2022 it dropped to 66 percent. Of the 22 million children who had not received a first vaccine in 2022, more than half lived in the following ten countries: Angola, Brazil, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Madagascar, Nigeria, Pakistan and the Philippines.
The WHO sees this decline as an alarming signal. “Children everywhere have the right to be protected by the life-saving measles vaccine,” it said in a statement.
Worldwide, the vaccination rate of the first MMR dose increased from 72 percent to 86 percent between 2000 and 2019. Since 2020, when the corona pandemic broke out, it has fallen to 83 percent. In 2021 it was 81 percent. In 2022, that figure rose slightly again, to 83 percent, but the vaccination rate continued to decline in developing countries.
The vaccination rate of the second MMR dose in 2022 was 74 percent worldwide.
Measles in the Netherlands
In the Netherlands, the chance of death in patients with measles is less than 1 in 10,000. The last time a child died from measles was in April this year, when it was a girl at Radboud University Medical Center in Nijmegen. Before that, a child died for the last time in the Netherlands from the effects of measles in 2019.
Medical microbiologist Matthew McCall of Radboud University Medical Center already warned in De Gelderlander about an increase in the number of reports of measles. This is because epidemics break out from time to time among population groups that do not get vaccinated. According to McCall, there is an uptick every four or eight years.
2023-11-22 05:47:03
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