Bangladesh faces outbreaks of diphtheria, whooping cough (pertussis) and polio after its measles epidemic unless it acts urgently, an independent committee of national and international experts has warned. AFP reported the findings on Monday from the committee's review of the national immunisation programme, carried out in early October, Samakal said.
Directorate General of Health Services figures show that the outbreak, under way since March, has killed more than 1,200 children and infected 220,000 people, the deadliest measles outbreak in the country in decades. The experts called it a warning sign of a weakening vaccination system.
The review found that only 82 per cent of children are fully vaccinated against a national target of 95 per cent, and about 40 per cent of vaccinator posts are vacant. Fifty-three per cent of cold chain technician posts, 34 per cent of health assistant posts and 45 per cent of posts at the Expanded Programme on Immunization headquarters are empty, as are 32 to 43 per cent of supervisory posts. Poor local planning leaves many children in urban slums, border areas and hard-to-reach places unvaccinated each year.
Without urgent risk reduction, the report says, large outbreaks of whooping cough, diphtheria and even vaccine-derived polio are only a matter of time. It also found medical waste being burned in the open at health facilities and sharps not separated.
Its recommendations include filling vacant posts quickly under a DGHS task force, allowing missed vaccines to be given up to the age of five, extending routine HPV vaccination to children aged 10 to 14, revising ward-level plans to find children who have never been vaccinated, and finalising a roadmap for the transition of the Gavi and polio programmes by December 2026.
The report has been submitted to the government. Health ministry spokesman Zahid Raihan said the first step in carrying out the recommendations would be to recruit vaccinators as soon as possible. A 70-member team, supported by the World Health Organization, UNICEF, Gavi and other partners, began the review early this month.
Since its programme began in 1979, Bangladesh had eliminated polio and neonatal tetanus and brought rubella and hepatitis B under control. A measles campaign planned for 2024 was delayed by the uprising and political unrest, and the 2025 campaign was disrupted by strikes and instability.
Photo: Measles-rubella vaccination programme at Dhaka Shishu Hospital, 2020, Press Information Department / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
Source: samakal
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