measure to stop measles outbreaks in Europe

Europe is experiencing a critical situation with measles. According to the European Centers for Disease Control and Surveillance (ECDC), cases of the disease were reported in 22 countries in 2023, most of which are concentrated in Romania (1687), Austria (172), France (111), Germany (72) and Belgium (70). The latest representative of this Great Britainwhich in some areas of the country is experiencing its worst moment since 1990.

This is the case West Midlands, which has accumulated 216 confirmed cases and 103 probable cases in recent months. Overall, the country ended the year with 1603 suspected casesThe situation has become so serious that some experts are urging adults to get vaccinated again to stop transmission of the virus.

The tone of the United Kingdom is the same as the tone of the whole European territory. According to the latest updated data in the World Health Organization (WHO) database, the number of cases in the region has increased from 938 confirmed last year to 30,601, which ends 2023.

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“Unless urgent action is taken, it is likely that the virus is spreading quickly in other regions with low MMR vaccine uptake,” Jenny Harris, chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency (Ukhsa), warned in a statement on Friday.

An expert has just highlighted the main obstacle in the fight against measles. In 1998, the WHO European Region set a goal of eliminating measles by 2010. low vaccination rate In some countries, they not only prevent the achievement of the goal, but also push it further and further.

Set of factors

The problem has several causes. As Diego García Martínez de Artola, representative of the Spanish Society of Infectious Diseases and Clinical Microbiology (SEIMC), explains, the first is related to problems caused by Covid, a similar situation almost all over the world. According to one study, about 17 million children were left without a first dose.

Also come into play wars this has happened in recent years, as in the case of Ukraine, and it has weakened health systems. Experts believe the country’s proximity to Romania could explain the outbreak in the country.

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The third relates to its false association with autism. In 1998, the English doctor Andrew Wakefield published in Lancet – one of the most prestigious journals – a study that showed her involvement in the origin of autism. Although in 2010 the magazine responded and admitted fraudulent nature of the studyThe damage has already been done.

The country’s vaccination rate has plummeted, Ukhsa data shows. To date, 89.9% of children have received their first dose, but the percentage drops to 85.6% in the case of the second. In London, coverage is even lower – 82.5% and 74.1% respectively. These numbers are far below what is desired to achieve proper population immunity, i.e. equal to or greater than 95%.

People who did not receive the vaccine as children have become a serious problem as adults because they not only get sick, but also large reservoir for the virus and they can get sick when the babies become weaker.

As it turned out García Martínez de Artola, newborns are usually protected by antibodies given to them by their mother (in the case of immunization), but from six to twelve monthsthe period between one dose and the next, “antibodies drop and there is a small group that may be more susceptible to the virus.”

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“A little more in adults, there are situations, especially in classes, in which several people who have not been vaccinated or have not developed enough antibodies coincide and an outbreak occurs,” the doctor continues about the need for proper vaccination of the entire population.

Vaccinate adults, protect children

For this reason, one of the measures proposed by Ukhsa is to strengthen the proposals opportunistic vaccination at all levels of the adult-oriented health care system, in addition to intensifying in the short term life-saving vaccination in the London area for teenagers and young adults, the most likely victims of the famous Wakefield effect.

“By increasing the immunity of adults, the likelihood asymptomatic infection and prevents an adult from becoming an involuntary carrier. MMR in adults may help restore some herd immunity this has been lost due to vaccine hesitancy,” writes Derek Gatherer, a vaccine expert and professor at the School of Health and Medicine at Lancaster University in the UK, in an article published in the journal Talk.

“Even if an adult received the MMR vaccine as a child or had a bout of measles a few days before vaccination, your immunity may decrease” he describes. Although most people develop lifelong immunity from the vaccine, the study, published in the journal Human vaccines and immunotherapy confirmed that there were cases where it decreased approximately 15 years after vaccination.

At the same time, a review published in 2019 Lancet Global Healthwhich analyzed measles cases reported to WHO from 2013 to 2017, found that of the 626,289 measles cases analyzed, 38,677 (25%) occurred in people who received two doses of the vaccine.

US case

The hypothesis put forward by the authors in this case is that In countries with consistently high vaccination coverage, the absence of wild virus circulation leads to a gradual decline in post-vaccination immunity. lack of immune stimulation.

That same year, the United States was considering administering a booster dose to the entire adult population to stop the measles outbreak it was facing at the time. They haven’t done this and it’s all speculation and speculation for now, but the latest bulletin published by the ECDC shows a lot of concern about what’s happening with this disease, particularly in the UK.

We must not forget that, even with all the tools we have, last year this disease ended the lives of 136,000 people.. Most of them were children.