Vaccination campaign against measles

Austria launches vaccination campaign against measles

01/12/2014

In Austria, the Ministry of Health is launching a new campaign against measles, mumps and rubella. It is estimated that around 10,000 people in the Alpine republic have contracted measles in recent years, with 16 children dying.

Do not underestimate disease
The viral diseases measles, mumps and rubella are according to experts by no means „harmless teething“. According to estimates, in Austria alone about 10,000 people fell ill with measles and 16 children died. With a new vaccination campaign, the Ministry of Health wants to tackle the problem. Health Minister Alois Stöger (SPÖ) explained: „Measles are not child's play. I remembered my childhood and asked my mom. We were five siblings - all were sick. It took a long time for me to go back to school. The danger is that you underestimate the disease and dismiss it as a childhood disease.“

Free children's vaccination program
In Austria since 1998 there is a free child vaccination program against measles, mumps and rubella. However, although the diseases by the MMR vaccine actually „relegated“ this is far from the case. „We also have outbreaks in the last two weeks with five reported cases. In 2008 we had a big outbreak in Salzburg, where students of an anthroposophical school fell ill because they were not vaccinated. Over the past twelve years we have had 1,000 reported measles cases“, said the Section Head of Public Health at the Ministry, Pamela, Rendi-Wagner.

WHO expects unreported numbers
The World Health Organization (WHO) expects a dark figure of ten. „That would be around 10,000 diseases in Austria. Sixteen children have died as a result of a fatal long-term episode. In Bulgaria alone, there were around 22,000 measles cases in 2010, with outbreaks in the five-digit range in France, Germany and Italy“, so Rendi-Wagner. The only protection against this is the MMR vaccine. According to the expert, the first vaccination should take place from the eleventh month of life and the second until the end of the second year of life. But „we are far too late for the children“, says Rendi-Wagner.

Vaccination rate of 95 percent
„For the two-year-olds, we first have protection rates between 60 and 80 percent. There is a need for action announced“, so Stöger. Only from a vaccination rate of the population of 95 percent, the so-called „stove guard“ which is crucial in stopping circulating the virus to persons who have never had the disease or can not get the vaccine, such as infants under 11 months, immunosuppressed and pregnant women. The Austrian Ministry of Health joins in with the WHO campaign. „We have not reached the vaccination rate of 95 percent at this time. We will not reach that by 2015 either. But we want to have the goal“, explained the section leader.

Young adults as a second target group
The second target group besides the parents and their babies are young adults. „We also see picking in the young adults from the mid-twenties until the end of the thirties. These are the age groups that have not yet been covered by the vaccination programs“, explained Rendi-Wagner. All Austrians up to the age of 45 have been offered the MMR vaccine for recreational vaccines since the summer of 2011. As the Section Head explained, the vaccine is extremely effective and well tolerated: „For the past 14 years, there has not been a single recognized measles vaccine vaccine - with three million vaccine doses since 1998.“

Combined measles mumps vaccine
In Germany, you can now get vaccinated with a quadruple vaccine against measles and mumps. This also protects against rubella and chickenpox. Vaccinations are recommended by the Standing Vaccination Commission (STIKO) of the Robert Koch Institute for various diseases and groups of people. In the year before last, for example, the STIKO decided to vaccinate teachers and nurses against mumps in general. The change in vaccination recommendations was the result of a mumps eruption in 2011 at a primary school in Nuremberg, where it was found that some teachers had no vaccine protection against the disease. This had significantly promoted the spread of the diseases. (Ad)