Last year, nearly 40 million children missed a measles vaccine amid lockdowns and a growing anti-vaccination movement, CDC report says

A record high of nearly 40 million children missed their measles vaccine last year, the CDC reports.

Vaccination rates for measles – one of the most contagious human viruses that is still completely preventable – have steadily declined since the start of the Covid pandemic.

Misinformation surrounding Covid vaccines has also led large sections of parents to oppose regular childhood vaccinations, despite the fact that vaccines are the most effective way to protect children from measles.

A joint report by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) found that 25 million children missed their first dose and another 14.7 million missed their second injection.

The decline is a setback for global efforts to eradicate the virus, which leaves millions of young children vulnerable to infection.

Researchers from the University of Liverpool analyzed Google Trends and found that searches for vaccines “had a sustained and growing presence throughout the pandemic”.

As of November 17, 2022, 51 measles cases in the United States have been reported to the CDC.

In 2019, 1,274 cases were confirmed in 31 states — the highest number since 1992 — with most cases unvaccinated.

WHO’s director general, dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “The paradox of the pandemic is that even though vaccines against Covid have been developed in record time and deployed in the largest vaccination campaign in history, routine immunization programs have been severely disrupted and millions of children have missed out on life-saving shots against deadly diseases like measles.”

He added: “Getting immunization programs back on track is absolutely essential. Behind every statistic in this report is a child at risk of a preventable disease.”

There was a surge in the anti-vaccination movement before Covid, but the push to get everyone vaccinated against this virus fueled the problem.

Conspiracy theories and fake news about vaccines circulated on social media during the pandemic and received more attention than ever.

Skepticism about the Covid vaccines would have undermined confidence in other traditional vaccines.

In 2021, around nine million measles cases and 128,000 deaths occurred worldwide.

A total of 22 countries have been affected by outbreaks.

According to the WHO and CDC report, the decline in immunization coverage has meant that “measles is an imminent threat in all regions of the world.”