Measles Outbreak Kills 1,000 Children
More than 1,000 children have died in a measles outbreak in Bangladesh, where cases are rising again despite an emergency vaccination campaign.
More than 19.8 million children in the country have already been vaccinated, but some 1,000 new suspected cases are still being reported every day.
UNICEF told the BBC that on 26th September, the government will move into an “intensified phase” of its campaign to reach children who have not yet been vaccinated.
Until March this year, Bangladesh had made “substantial progress” towards eliminating measles, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
But WHO data now shows it has had more measles cases than any other country so far this year.
The latest government figures show there have been more than 194,000 cases since March from the highly contagious disease, which spreads easily through breathing, coughing or sneezing.
On Tuesday alone, eight more people died with suspected measles.
Measles in the South Asian nation of 178 million people surged in March this year, with UNICEF calling the initial outbreak a “perform storm” of several factors, including an overcrowded population and the Covid pandemic having delayed routine immunisation.
The UN agency had earlier claimed that the government of Muhammad Yunus, Bangladesh’s former interim leader, had delayed ordering vaccines last year, leading to shortages.
Bangladesh has seen years of political turmoil, with student-led protests in 2024 toppling the country’s authoritarian leader, former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
UNICEF claims the interim government that succeeded her delayed vaccine orders to consider new vendors, despite warnings of the risks involved.
“We were worried about possible [vaccine] gaps increasing, and it’s unfolding into what we’re now seeing,” Miguel Mateos Muñoz, a UNICEF spokesperson, had told the BBC in June.
However, Yunus’s former top health ministry official had denied any shortage of vaccines./BBC
