Double trouble

The Covid-19 virus no doubt presents immense dangers to health in its own right. But according to Unicef health experts, it is already placing a huge additional burden on healthcare systems which even before Covid struck have struggled to cope with health needs. The WHO has expressed grave concern over the finding that currently 24 countries have suspended widespread vaccinations against preventable diseases. Several of these countries are already dealing with large-scale measles outbreaks. The measles and rubella initiative for the WHO has said that it is vital that immunisation capacity is retained during and after the current pandemic. It has warned that measles, a highly contagious disease with potential complications, affects around 20 million people each year, most of them aged under five. Measles generally affects children under 12 months of age; and they are most likely to die from its complications. There is also concern over the fact that tens of thousands of children, many of them in developed countries, have not been vaccinated against measles because of perceptions among parents that the vaccination may be harmful. For Pakistan of course, vaccination campaigns against polio and also diseases like measles have consistently run into problems. We have seen over the last year a sharp rise in cases of polio. Today, Bangladesh, Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan, the Ukraine and other countries are battling a large number of measles deaths. Just as the WHO was about to announce the end of the ebola crisis, a new case has been reported in the Congo.

The problem, experts warn, is that a combination of diseases hitting populations at a single period in time would cripple the healthcare system even further. Healthcare, even in the most advanced nations of the world, is already struggling to cope with Covid-19 and the large number of patients coming in. A suspension of drives against other diseases for which vaccines exist means that health risks would increase and put a larger number of people in peril. While it is true that healthcare workers around the world are overwhelmed, there is still a need to make sure routine vaccination campaigns are carried out. In their absence, there is also the risk that an unvaccinated child with Covid-19 could also contract a preventable infectious disease. This would complicate the treatment options for doctors. The problem needs to be looked at seriously by all countries, notably ones like Pakistan where vaccinations have not always been managed effectively and where millions of children each year end up without protection.