{"id":83717,"date":"2022-11-18T12:39:43","date_gmt":"2022-11-18T12:39:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theoutlier.co.za\/?p=83717"},"modified":"2025-11-17T17:42:42","modified_gmt":"2025-11-17T17:42:42","slug":"second-measles-outbreak-this-year-in-sa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/2022\/11\/18\/second-measles-outbreak-this-year-in-sa\/","title":{"rendered":"Mostly children affected by measles as outbreak grows"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>At least 57 cases of measles have been reported in Limpopo and Mpumalanga in just over a month.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Before widespread vaccination in the 1980s measles caused an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afro.who.int\/health-topics\/measles#:~:text=In%201980%2C%20before%20widespread%20vaccination,a%20safe%20and%20effective%20vaccine\">estimated 2.6 million deaths<\/a> every year globally.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>In the&nbsp; 2000s reported measles cases in SA had dropped to around 100 per year.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>SA\u2019s last large outbreak was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.samj.org.za\/index.php\/samj\/article\/view\/5984\/4424#:~:text=Between%202009%20and%202010%2C%20South,National%20Institute%20of%20Communicable%20Diseases.&amp;text=In%20total%2C%201%20861%20children,%25\">more than 18,000 cases<\/a> in 2009-2010.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>An estimated 72.8% of South Africans have been vaccinated against measles.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>More than 57 cases of measles have been reported in Limpopo and Mpumalanga in just over a month, prompting the National Institute For Communicable Diseases Of South Africa (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nicd.ac.za\/\">NICD<\/a>) to issue an outbreak <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nicd.ac.za\/measles-outbreak-update-in-south-africa-17-november-2022\/\">alert<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The majority of cases reported have been in children in the 13 months to 9 years old age group.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-600-wide size\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/editor.mediahack.co.za\/theoutlier\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2022\/11\/Group-1-13-600x600.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-83718\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Measles is airborne, highly contagious and it can present flu-like symptoms such as a cough, runny nose, sore throat, fever and rash. A measles outbreak is classified as at least three laboratory-confirmed measles cases reported within 30 days in a district.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Before widespread vaccination in the 1980s measles caused an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.afro.who.int\/health-topics\/measles#:~:text=In%201980%2C%20before%20widespread%20vaccination,a%20safe%20and%20effective%20vaccine\">estimated 2.6 million deaths<\/a> every year globally.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-600-wide size\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/editor.mediahack.co.za\/theoutlier\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2022\/11\/Group-3-6-600x600.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-83719\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>In South Africa, vaccination programmes reduced reported measles cases from around <a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/grapher\/reported-cases-of-measles?country=~ZAF\">20,000 a year to fewer than 100 per year<\/a> in between 1980 and the early 2000s. An estimated 72.8% of South Africans are vaccinated against measles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In South Africa, measles vaccinations can take two routes. In the private sector, the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine is available and is priced from R276.00 to R400.00 a shot. In the public sector, a measles vaccine known as Measbio is administered free of charge in two doses, first at six months of age and then at around 12 months of age.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe outbreak in [South Africa] is of concern because it comes at a time when measles vaccination coverage is lower than it should be\u2026 When many people are not vaccinated, introduction of a case into the community may lead to an outbreak,\u201d says the NICD\u2019s Dr Kerrigan McCarthy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>South Africa had one of its worst measles outbreaks from 2009 to 2010 when <a href=\"http:\/\/www.samj.org.za\/index.php\/samj\/article\/view\/5984\/4424#:~:text=Between%202009%20and%202010%2C%20South,National%20Institute%20of%20Communicable%20Diseases.&amp;text=In%20total%2C%201%20861%20children,%25\">more than 18,000 cases<\/a> were detected, but the country has since reverted to the previous lower levels.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-600-wide size\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/editor.mediahack.co.za\/theoutlier\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2022\/11\/Group-10-6-600x600.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-83720\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" style=\"font-size:clamp(16.293px, 1.018rem + ((1vw - 3.2px) * 0.907), 25px);\"><strong>Africa<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Africa is the continent worst affected by measles in the twenty-first century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In April this year, a measles outbreak was declared in Zimbabwe. Since then 7,504 cases of the virus have been recorded, along with 744 deaths according to an October <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nicd.ac.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/NICD-Monthly-Communique%CC%81-Oct-2022.pdf\">report<\/a> by the NICD. In another <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nicd.ac.za\/measles-cases-and-measles-outbreaks-in-south-africa-17-november-2022\/\">report<\/a>, the NICD stated that one of the measles cases in Limpopo resulted from contact with someone linked to the measles circulation in Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Zimbabwe and South Africa are just two of around 17 African countries still battling occasional outbreaks this year according to data from the NICD.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why has the NICD issued an outbreak warning over measles?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":83722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,446,1387],"tags":[225,179,226,227,228,229,230,231,232,40,233,234,235],"newsletter-post":[],"site":[],"class_list":["post-83717","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","category-news","category-the-outlier","tag-cases","tag-deaths","tag-diagnosis","tag-disease","tag-immunisation","tag-measles","tag-nicd","tag-outbreak","tag-sick","tag-south-africa","tag-symptoms","tag-vaccination","tag-vaccine"],"acf":{"big_number":null,"big_number_caption":null,"big_number_link":null,"big_number_background":null,"big_number_text_colour":null,"big_number_icon":null,"big_number_wide":null,"featured_chart":null,"flourish_chart_id":null,"flourish_sub_title":null,"flourish_chart_width":null,"is_newsletter_post":null,"post_style":null,"show_on_front":null,"link_through":null,"chart_url":null,"background_colour":null,"text_colour":null},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83717","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83717"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83717\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86588,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83717\/revisions\/86588"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83717"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83717"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83717"},{"taxonomy":"newsletter-post","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newsletter-post?post=83717"},{"taxonomy":"site","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outliereditor.co.za\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/site?post=83717"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}