CDC Renews Call for Measles Vaccination
By Joan Oleck -- School Library Journal, 5/7/2008 9:20:00 AM
Faced with the worst outbreak of measles in six years, federal health officials here are renewing their call for vaccinations of children.
Last month, the Centers for Disease Control confirmed reports of 64 cases in nine states, requiring the hospitalization of 14 people, a CDC spokesman told the Associated Press. That figure may have been low: Last week, Washington added at least eight more cases.
Of the 64 cases that the CDC confirmed, 63 were either unvaccinated, or it was not known whether they had been vaccinated. Some 54 of the cases were related to outbreaks in Switzerland, Israel, or other countries, the CDC said.
The measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine, which first came on the market in 1963, is 99 percent effective and, according to CDC data, has been administered to 95.6 percent of children by the time they enter school. Americans born before 1957 are presumed to be immune because of the nearly-universal exposure to measles during that pre-vaccination era.
The other major cause for the recent outbreak was an incidence in children younger than one who contracted the virus because they were too young to get the immunization. Thirteen of the 63 cases were in children younger than one.
The largest concentrations of cases took place in New York City, with 22 cases; Arizona, with 15; California, with 12; and Michigan and Wisconsin, with 4 each. Hawaii, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and upstate New York also reported cases.
In 1958, before vaccinations, 763,000 cases were reported, along with 552 deaths. Although widespread vaccination began in the early 1960s, outbreaks in the early 1990s prompted a revision of guidelines to include vaccination for children younger than school age.
