Nearly 20m children around the world miss out on life-saving vaccines

More than one in 10 children around the world miss out on basic life-saving vaccinations, according to figures released by the World Health Organization.

To mark World Immunisation Week, running from April 24 to April 28, WHO is highlighting the importance of vaccines but is also warning that a large number of children do not receive any vaccinations at all.

An estimated 19.5m children missed out on the basic diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis – or whooping cough – (DTP) vaccine in 2016, estimates WHO.

Despite efforts to boost vaccination rates over the past decade progress has stalled and just 86 per cent of infants worldwide – 116.5m – received the basic DTP vaccine. 

WHO says that between two and three million lives are saved every year through the DTP vaccine but an additional 1.5million deaths could be avoided if coverage improved. 

About 60 per cent of the children missing out on these life-saving vaccines live in just 10 countries.

WHO recommends that all children should be given the following vaccines: BCG where there are high rates of tuberculosis; hepatitis B; polio; DTP; Haemophilus influenzae type b; pneumococcal disease; rotavirus; measles; and rubella.

It also recommends that adolescent girls are vaccinated against the human papilloma virus to protect them from contracting cervical cancer. And some vaccines, such as yellow fever, are recommended for particular regions. 

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director general

However, poor vaccine coverage is not just a problem in developing countries. Latest data from WHO shows that in Europe there were 21,000 cases of measles in 2017, compared to 5,000 the previous year.

And this was partly due to a decline in the number of people vaccinated as well as a shortage in the supply of vaccines and poor disease surveillance, said WHO.

The largest outbreaks of the disease were in Romania, where there were 5,562 cases and Italy, where there were 5,006 cases. In Germany there were 927 cases and the disease and in the UK there were 282. 

WHO launched the Global Vaccine Action Plan in 2011 with a goal to preventing millions of deaths but some key targets are off track.

For example, 40 priority countries should have eliminated maternal and neonatal tetanus by 2015 but only 18 countries have met this goal. And by 2016 at least four WHO world regions should have eliminated measles – only one, the WHO region of the Americas, has achieved this. 

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the WHO, said World Immunisation Week, was an opportunity "to remind everyone of the incredible value of vaccines".

"Yes, vaccines work, vaccines prevent disease, vaccines save lives," he said. 

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