The number of deaths due to measles since 2000 has decreased by 79 percent in the world. The reason for this is mass vaccination campaigns. Despite the vaccinations around 350 children die from the disease daily.
A recent report by the UNICEF on global efforts to make measles history said the fight against the disease is not hampered by lack of tools or awareness but because of a lack of political will in getting every child immunized against this disease.
Robin Nandy, UNICEF head of immunization said, “Without this commitment, children will continue to die from a disease that is easy and cheap to prevent.” The report said in the past 15 years about 20.3 million young lives have been saved. This was with the effort of measles vaccination campaigns and a worldwide increase in vaccine coverage. In many countries, a majority of children are not vaccinated which results in death.
According to the report, places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Nigeria and Pakistan are responsible for 75 percent of the deaths due to measles and more than half of the babies are unvaccinated. It was further reported by UNICEF that there ae immunization gaps, which lead to the high number of deaths.
Measles,a highly contagious virus, spreads by direct contact or through air. It is preventable by vaccine. It cannot be cured but treatment can help.
In the past, there have been reports of outbreaks of measles in Egypt, Ethiopia, Germany, Kyrgyzstan and Mongolia. In Germany and Mongolia, older people were affected by this disease. The UNICEF report emphasized that it is necessary to immunize the young people who have missed the vaccinations. Last year, measle outbreaks increased in Nigeria, Somalia and South Sudan due to conflict and humanitarian crises.
