Around 25 million children worldwide have skipped the regimen’s vaccines against common diseases such as diphtheria, largely because the coronavirus pandemic has disrupted normal physical fitness or caused incorrect information about vaccines, according to the UN.
In a new report released Friday, the World Health Organization and UNICEF said their figures show that 25 million children last year were not vaccinated against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, an indicator of immunization coverage in the formative years, following a downward trend that began in 2019. .
“This is a red alert for children’s health,” said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. “We are witnessing the sustained decline in immunization in the formative years in a generation,” he said, adding that the consequences would be measured in lives lost.
The knowledge showed that the vast majority of young people who were vaccinated lived in emerging countries, namely Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Nigeria and the Philippines. While immunization policy has fallen in all regions of the world, the worst effects have been felt in the East. Asia and the Pacific.
Experts said this “historic decline” in vaccination policy was worrying, as it happened as rates of severe malnutrition rose. Malnourished young people often have weaker immune systems and infections such as measles can be fatal to them.
“The convergence of a hunger crisis with a developing immunization deficit threatens to create a child’s survival crisis,” the UN said.
Scientists said low vaccination policy rates have already led to preventable outbreaks of diseases such as measles and polio. There have been dozens of polio outbreaks in more than 30 countries.
“This is tragic, as massive strides have been made in the two decades leading up to the covid pandemic to improve vaccination rates for young people around the world,” said Helen Bedford, a professor of children’s fitness at University College London, who was unrelated to the UN Report. She said the news was shocking but not surprising, noting that immunization facilities are a “first victim” of major social or economic disasters.
Dr David Elliman, a paediatrician representing Britain’s Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital, said it is imperative to oppose the downward trend in vaccination among children.
“The effects of what is in a component of the global may impact the global total,” he said in a statement, noting the immediate spread of covid-19 and, more recently, monkeypox. “If we act on the basis of enlightened ethics or self-interest, we want to put (children) at the top of our list of priorities. “