The Case for Global Measles Eradication

Catastrophe and Conflict: Disaster Diplomacy and Its Foreign Policy Implications

“…From the beginning of measles eradication efforts, which would be based entirely on vaccination, the case was made on clinical and economic bases (Foege, 1982;Hopkins et al, 1982). Diplomatic challenges and diplomatic outcomes, such as prospects for measles eradication to be an impetus towards conflict reduction or conflict resolution, were not discussed.…”

Eradication of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases

“…The continuing toll of measles and the striking impact of successful immunization programs have led to serious consideration of measles eradication (42). National elimination targets were established in several countries (including Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Sweden, and the United States) through the 1980s, and regional elimination targets have been set for WHO's American Region (PAHO, 2000), Europe (EURO, 2000, now being revised to 2007), and the Western Pacific (WPRO, 2000), and are being considered for the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMRO, 2010).…”

“…Three of these conditions (polio, mumps, and rubella) are vaccinepreventable diseases. Although the Task Force concluded that measles was not eradicable with current technology, others felt that it was (42). Recent meetings on measles have concluded that it is eradicable with current technology and have called for establishment of an eradication target year (2010) (14,19).…”

Prevention: Rhetoric and Reality

“…For example, not only has the incidence of measles declined so sharply in the United States that imported cases are now the major hazard, but so has the incidence of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, a slow virus infection of the CNS which follows measles and leads to mental deterioration and death (Hopkins et al 1982). Yet public controversy in the UK about pertussis vaccine reactions resulted in a sharp drop in immunization levels from about 77% in 1974 to 30% in 1978.…”

“…It is surely intolerable, in view of the enormous ratio of benefit to cost from childhood vaccinations, that we fall short of complete population coverage. Those of us in developed countries ought also to be willing to invest resources and manpower in vaccination programmes in the Third World, where the mortality and morbidity rates from these infections are much higher than they are in the West (Hopkins et al 1982).…”