UK vaccine coverage drop leads to measles outbreaks

The consequence of a decade of parental resistance in  the UK to the combination measles, mumps and rubella vaccine has manifested itself in  the form of record outbreaks of measles. In England and Wales, there  were 1,049 reported cases of the disease from January to October 2008,  more than for the whole of the previous year.

According to the UK's public broadcaster, the BBC, an estimated one in  four children in England and Wales, about three million, have not had  the two doses of MMR vaccine required for immunity. Coverage levels in  Scotland and Northern Ireland are reportedly higher.

Mary Ramsay, a spokesperson for the Health Protection Agency, told the  BBC: "the 1,049 figure is the highest number of measles cases record in  England and Wales since the current method of monitoring the disease was  introduced in 1995."