Washington-SANA
An international report warned that measles vaccination has been declining worldwide since the Covid-19 pandemic, putting tens of millions of children at risk.
According to the joint report issued by the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in the year 2021, about 40 million children missed a dose of the measles vaccine, including 25 million who missed the first dose, and 14.7 million who missed the second dose.
"For three years we have been sounding the alarm about low vaccination rates and increasing risks to children's health around the world," said AFP, the official in charge of vaccination programs at the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), Ephrem Tekle Limango, in a statement. We have a narrow window in front of us to make up for missed vaccination doses.”
In turn, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said: Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, immunization programs have been seriously affected, adding: “Behind every statistic in this report, there is a child at risk of contracting a preventable disease.”
The report pointed out that the rate of global coverage of measles vaccination in its first dose fell to its lowest level since 2008, and among the countries with the largest number of unvaccinated children against measles are Nigeria, India, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia and Indonesia.
According to the report, it is estimated that the number of people infected with measles in 2021 reached nine million, of whom 128,000 died.
And last April, the World Health Organization warned that reported measles cases increased by about 80 percent in the first two months of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021.
"There is no time to lose and we must act urgently to ensure that these life-saving vaccines reach every child," said Elizabeth Cousins, chair of the United Nations Foundation.
Measles is a highly contagious viral disease that has no cure but can be prevented with two vaccines.
Measles causes high fever and rash, and is contagious over a four-day period, before and after symptoms appear.
Although the symptoms of this disease are often benign, they can be dangerous at other times, as they may lead to complications in the respiratory (pneumonia) and nervous (encephalitis) systems, especially in people who suffer from poor health.
Follow SANA's news on Telegram https://t.me/SyrianArabNewsAgency
