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Deaths from measles fall by 78% worldwide
Thanks to mass vaccination campaigns, death from measles has fallen by 90% since the year 2000 in almost every region of the world except south-east Asia. And globally, deaths associated with this disease have fallen by 78%.
This figure, though encouraging, is still not high enough: every day, in fact, measles claims another 450 victims. The WHO is also concerned about the risks of a resurgence of the disease. Measles is one of the most contagious diseases. It can rapidly take advantage of any slowing down of our efforts, points out the Organisation’s Director General, Dr Margaret Chan.
However, the vaccination of around 700 million children worldwide has helped to save the lives of 4.3 million children in less than 10 years. The more limited progress achieved in south-east Asia, where mortality has only fallen by 46%, is mainly due to poor results in India: three quarters of the children who died from measles in 2008 were Indian.
And metropolitan France has little to boast about either: the vaccination coverage rate is 90% by the age of 24 months for the first vaccination – whereas the WHO recommends 95% coverage if the disease is to be eradicated… so France, and other European countries too, are not exactly at the top of the class!
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