After the World Health Organization warned in a joint report with the US Center for Disease Control that measles has become a renewed global threat after 22 million children missed their vaccinations due to the Corona epidemic, we learn in this report the importance of vaccination against measles, according to a network website.CNN“American.
Measles is one of the most contagious viruses known and still kills more than 60,000 people annually, mostly young children, but it killed more than a million annually until 2000 and measles vaccination campaigns have changed these numbers and helped bring them down.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimatesCDC) that measles vaccination programs prevent more than 31 million deaths annually.
“The major and devastating 2020 measles outbreak indicates that measles transmission is underreported,” the CDC team wrote in the agency’s weekly report on mortality and illness.
“More than 22 million children have missed their first dose of measles vaccine — a rate of 3 million more than in 2019 and the largest annual increase in more than 20 years,” the CDC said.
measles vaccination
The CDC and the World Health Organization have warned that the pandemic has damaged routine childhood vaccination programs.
“Large numbers of unvaccinated children, measles outbreaks, and disease detection and diagnosis are all factors that increase the likelihood of measles-related deaths and serious complications in children,” said Dr. Kevin Kane, director of global immunization at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Although we haven’t seen an increase in cases yet, measles is simply very contagious if we don’t act, it will turn into outbreaks, and many children will be exposed to a preventable but potentially fatal disease,” said Ephrem Tekle Limango, UNICEF Associate Director of Immunization. .