- According to data by the WHO and UNICEF,One in 10 children which is almost 20 million globally has missed out on life saving vaccines in 2018.
- The report also showed that an additional 1.5 million deaths could be avoided if global immunisation coverage improved.
- The main factors which are hindering the spread of vaccination worldwide are war and under-investment in national immunisation programmes.
- The report says that the global protection against four diseases namely diphtheria,tetanus, pertussis and measles has stalled at around 86 % since 2010.Ideally,it should be 95 % across countries and communities globally.
- Further,the data provides that ten countries accounted for 11.7 of the 19.4 million under and non-vaccinated children in the world in particular Nigeria (three million), India (2.6 million) and Pakistan (1.4 million).
- The best regional performer for vaccine reach in 2018 was Europe with more than 90 % coverage rate.However,Africa was the lowest performing region.
- The data also provides that some 350,000 measles cases were reported globally last year which is more than double the 2017 number.Ukraine has been identified as the country with the highest measles incidence rate in 2018.
