It is a disease that is spreading ever faster and faster. The number of measles cases in Europe continues to explode and could exceed the very high threshold by 2023, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned on Tuesday, May 28, emphasizing the importance of vaccination.
56,634 measles cases and four deaths were recorded in 45 of the 53 member countries of the WHO Europe region, which extends to Central Asia, during the first three months of 2024, according to figures from the WHO. ‘organization. That’s barely 5,000 fewer than for the whole of 2023, when 61,070 cases – and 13 deaths – were reported across 41 countries. But it is also and above all 60 times more than in 2022, when 941 cases of measles were reported.
“Even a single case of measles should constitute an urgent call to action,” warned WHO Europe Director Hans Kluge, quoted in a press release. “I urge all countries to take immediate action, even when overall vaccination coverage is high, to vaccinate vulnerable people, fill immunity gaps and thereby prevent the virus from taking hold in any community “, he added.
Insufficient vaccination
A highly contagious viral disease, measles is often benign, but can cause serious respiratory and neurological complications. It mainly affects children, but not only. In 2023, almost half of cases involved children under five.
“This reflects the accumulation of children who have not received routine vaccinations against measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases during the Covid-19 pandemic,” noted the WHO in a press release deploring the presence of cases in 27 of the 33 Member States where the virus had been eliminated.
Thus, between 2020 and 2022, more than 1.8 million infants in Europe have not been vaccinated against measles. “The pandemic has put a drastic brake on all vaccination campaigns, whether for measles or poliomyelitis. This is the consequence of confinement, the reorientation of budgets and the tension in health systems… As well as the loss of confidence in health authorities”, analyzed last January with L’Express Anne Sénéquier, co-director of the Global Health Observatory at the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (Iris), and author of Simply Geopolitics (Eyrolles editions).
117 cases in France in 2023
An observation shared by Unicef, which is also concerned about this explosion of cases. “A surge in measles cases is a clear sign of a failure in vaccination coverage. As measles cases continue to rise, we need urgent government action to strengthen health systems and implement effective public health measures to protect all children from this dangerous but preventable disease,” said Regina De Dominicis, the organization’s regional director for Europe and Central Asia.
Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Russia are the most affected countries with respectively more than 36,000, 28,000 and 18,000 cases between April 2023 and March 2024. With 1,008 cases, the United Kingdom is, ahead of Austria (456 cases) the country in Western Europe where the resurgence of the disease, considered to have been eliminated in 2021, is the most obvious. In France, data for the year 2024 have not yet been communicated. In 2023, 117 cases of measles, including 31 imported, were reported to Public Health France.