Measles cases declining as more are being immunized: Duque

April 30, 2019

About 3.8 million children were immunized against measles since February amid the nationwide measles outbreak, according to Health Secretary Francisco Duque Tuesday.

Duque said in a press conference at the World Immunization Week that cases of measles among children have gone down since they declared an outbreak last February.

The areas were measles outbreak were declared are Central Luzon, Metro Manila, Calabarzon, Western Visayas, and Central Visayas. 

"(The number of immunized children) aged six to 59 months reached 93 percent equivalent to 3.5 million children as opposed to the target of 3.7 million,'' said Duque.

For grade schoolers, the target is 8.5 million and as of April 24, the figures reached 11 percent or 944,000. Immunized children aged 12 years old and above are at 42 percent or 922,954 from the 2.2 million target, Duque said.

Duque added their data showed a downtrend in the number of reported measles cases nationwide.

From the 771 cases during January, the peak of 3,743 cases came in February when the measles was declared as an epidemic. It has gone down to 775 on April, said Duque. 

"From 3,179 reported cases per week during the peak month, it is now 3,775 per week. From 95 cases of hospital admissions per day to 12 cases," he explained.

"This evidently showed how effective our campaign, our immunization response has been," he added. 

But Duque, World Health Organization Country Representative  Gundo Aurel Weller and UNICEF Chief of Health and Nutrition  Wiglan Madani said the effort to immunize children shouldn't decline as well. 

"Immunization activities cannot be allowed to wax and wane, it has to be sustained. We have to be consistent, not "ningas kugon,' once it's there all of a sudden we just let go'," Duque said. 

"It's important to focus on the next step, the unfinished business," Madani said. 

"The problem is that this is not the first time that this has happened, we had outbreak in the past. There's a lot of capacity and effort in responding but then after we go back to business as usual, there is building up again a pool of unvaccinated children," Weller added.

DOH said it will not lift the outbreak until it has achieved their target of 95 percent immunized children aged six to 59 months old, school-based, and adults. They also said it will ensure people are healthy. 

"The work is far from over, far from complete," the health secretary said. Cristina Eloisa Baclig/DMS