The United Nations (UN) has reported that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, measles immunisation campaigns have been delayed in 24 countries and will be canceled in 13 others. This is primarily because healthcare workers are needed to manage the pandemic in countries where healthcare systems are insufficiently robust.
Impact of the Pandemic on Immunisation Campaigns
The coronavirus pandemic has necessitated various prevention measures, including stringent lockdowns, which have resulted in children missing out on routine immunisation services for diseases such as polio, yellow fever, and cholera. Countries like Mexico, Bolivia, Lebanon, Nepal and Chile among others have postponed their immunisation campaigns.
Current Measles Outbreaks and Its Contagiousness
Nations currently tackling measles outbreaks include Nigeria, Ukraine, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Kazakhstan among others. A report in the journal Nature reveals that the reproduction number for measles, implying the amount of people who get infected by an individual with the disease, ranges between 12-18, identifying measles as the most contagious virus known.
WHO Guidelines and Strategies
The World Health Organization (WHO) professes that mass immunisation drives and routine vaccination for children are the primary public health strategies against measles. The delay in these campaigns risks the lives of thousands of children. In March 2020, WHO released interim guidelines for executing immunisation activities during the Covid-19 crisis, urging countries to devise strategies for delivering “catch-up” vaccines post the outbreak.
Implementation of this would require tracking those who missed getting vaccinated, assessing immunity gaps and re-establishing community demand. Additionally, it advised temporary suspension of mass immunisation campaigns due to the Covid-19 pandemic, urging continuous monitoring of the need to delay these campaigns.
About Measles
Measles is a highly contagious viral disease, posing as a significant cause of death in young children worldwide, despite the availability of a vaccine. The disease is transmitted via droplets from the nose, mouth or throat of infected individuals, with symptoms appearing 10-12 days post infection and may include high fever, runny nose, bloodshot eyes, and white spots inside the mouth.
Serious complications can arise from the disease, such as blindness, encephalitis (brain swelling), severe diarrhea, dehydration and severe respiratory infections like pneumonia. Measles is common in parts of Africa and Asia, especially amongst poorly nourished children, particularly those deficient in vitamin A. The disease claimed 140,000 lives in 2018, primarily children and babies.
Measles Vaccine
Since the 1960s, the measles vaccine has been available and is recognized as safe, effective and inexpensive. WHO recommends two doses of the measles vaccine for all children, either standalone or in combinations such as measles-rubella (MR), measles-mumps-rubella (MMR), or measles-mumps-rubella-varicella (MMRV) within all national immunization programmes.
In India, the first dose of measles vaccine surfaced in the 1990s, with a second dose introduced in 2010. In 2019, Sri Lanka joined Bhutan, Maldives, DPR Korea and Timor-Leste as the fifth country in the WHO Southeast Asia region to eliminate measles.
