The Ministry of Health insists on the importance of measles vaccination to prevent transmission of the disease.

The measles outbreak was identified in four cases, the index case of which corresponds to an unvaccinated minor. Of the other three cases, two were infants who had not yet received their first dose due to age, and one was an adult.

Since 2017, the WHO has declared Spain free of endemic measles transmission due to the low number of detected cases and outbreaks. However, cases have recently been reported in nine autonomous communities, one of them is the Canary Islands.

The Ministry of Health of the Government of the Canary Islands, through the General Directorate of Public Health SCS, is mindful of the importance of vaccination to prevent the transmission of measles; a disease that had had no new cases reported for many years and was present again in our community when an outbreak was reported, with the first case being a minor who had not been vaccinated.

Measles is a febrile exanthematous disease that begins with fever, nasal congestion, cough, and sometimes small erythematous spots with a whitish center may appear on the oral mucosa. The rash, which appears three to seven days after the onset of symptoms, begins on the face and spreads throughout the body. It is highly contagious and is transmitted through respiratory droplets or direct contact with infected people.

In 2017, WHO declared Spain free of endemic measles transmission due to the low number of detected cases and outbreaks. However, cases have recently been reported in nine autonomous regions, with outbreaks reported in five of them.

Reported cases

Until the first week of May, there were 42 confirmed cases of measles in Spain.

There is a measles outbreak in the Canary Islands with four confirmed cases, of which three are minors and one is an adult. The index case corresponds to a minor who was not vaccinated, while the two affected children had not yet been vaccinated. The General Directorate of Public Health followed up more than 400 contacts of the cases to check their vaccination status and inform them of measures to take if they begin to show symptoms.

The measles vaccine is given in two doses at 12 months and three years of age, and 95 percent of the Canary Islands population is vaccinated correctly in the first year of life.

The Directorate General of Public Health insists that the vaccine is the most effective way to prevent contracting or transmitting measles.