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More than 10 million people got measles in 2023, and 107,500 died.
ADVERTISEMENTThe United States has registered its first death from measles since 2015, after a child who wasn’t vaccinated died in an outbreak in rural West Texas.
Normally, most US cases are brought into the country by people who have travelled overseas. So far, Texas state officials have reported 124 cases. Neighbouring New Mexico has reported nine.
Experts point to declining measles vaccination rates worldwide since the COVID-19 pandemic. In the US, most states now are below the 95 per cent vaccination threshold for young children – the level needed to protect communities against measles outbreaks.
Measles cases in the US last year were nearly double the total for all of 2023, raising concerns about the preventable, once-common childhood virus.
«Measles anywhere is a threat everywhere,» the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says on their website.
Here’s a brief look at the global measles situation.
Are measles outbreaks common outside the US?
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), an estimated 10.3 million people were infected with measles and 107,500 died in 2023. Most were unvaccinated people or children younger than five.
Cases were most common in parts of Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, where incomes are low and health services insufficient.
In places where measles have largely been eradicated, cases have been spread by travellers from other countries.
Major outbreaks were seen in 57 countries in 2023, including India, Indonesia, Russia, Yemen, and Iraq. The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) saw the most cases, with 311,500 infections that year.
How common are measles cases in Europe?
Like other parts of the world, Europe has experienced a «substantial upsurge» in measles cases in recent years, according to the WHO.
In the first three months of 2024, measles was reported in 45 of the WHO European region’s 53 countries, totalling nearly 57,000 cases and four deaths.
Meanwhile Britain confirmed 2,911 measles cases in 2024, the highest number of cases recorded annually since 2012.
«Even one case of measles should be an urgent call to action,» said Hans Kluge, WHO’s Europe director.
What is the impact of vaccinations?
The worldwide rate of childhood vaccinations has fallen in recent years, to 83 per cent in 2023 from 86 per cent in 2019, partly due to disruptions in immunisation and healthcare due to the pandemic.
ADVERTISEMENTThe WHO estimates that vaccination helped to prevent more than 60 million deaths worldwide between 2000 and 2023, as efforts to get the shots to more people ramped up.
Before the vaccine was introduced in 1963, major epidemics caused about 2.6 million deaths a year.
Independent experts declared the Americas free of endemic measles in 2016, but that status was lost in 2018 due to measles outbreaks in Brazil and Venezuela. Reduced vaccination rates are undermining efforts to fully eradicate the disease, experts say.
Measles is so highly infectious that 95 per cent immunity is required to prevent epidemics, the WHO says. Put another way, it infects about 9 of 10 people exposed if they lack immunity.
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