Research warns of the far-reaching consequences of measles epidemic and failure to vaccinate

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-09/esoc-rwo090319.php

News Release 5-Sep-2019
European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases

The European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID) 5th Vaccine Conference will hear that the risks of failing to vaccinate children may extend far beyond one specific vaccine, although currently the most urgent problem to address is the resurgence of measles.

Measles, a highly contagious infectious disease, is serious, causing fever, rash and other symptoms in most children and complications including pneumonia and brain inflammation. In 2018, across the globe measles killed approximately 1 in every 75 children infected with the virus, leading to over 100,000 deaths.

Furthermore, research by Assistant Professor Michael Mina, MD of Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA and colleagues from his own and other groups suggests that infection with measles in unvaccinated children increases their risk of other, subsequent severe, non-measles infectious diseases in the 2-3 years following infection. Thus, after surviving measles, children may fall ill or die from other infections which they previously developed immunity to, but this immunity was erased by the measles virus.

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