Nearly half of pupils unvaccinated in some areas of Britain amid measles outbreak

ALMOST half of children have not been vaccinated against measles in some areas, official data show.

Hackney, where only 56.3 per cent of children have received the MMR jab, has the lowest uptake in the country. The east London borough’s council is among local authorities warning parents that unvaccinated pupils could be forced to self-isolate for up to three weeks if their classmates catch measles.

The same warning has been issued to parents across Birmingham, which is now at the epicentre of the worst outbreak of measles since the 1990s. More than 300 cases of the disease have been confirmed or identified as “likely” since October in the West Midlands. Unvaccinated children have been sent home from schools for up to 21 days, in a bid to stop the spread of disease, while catch-up vaccination clinics have been created for parents, staff and children.

The latest figures show that the lowest uptake of MMR jabs is in London, with 14 boroughs demonstrating the worst uptake. Outside of London, it was found that Liverpool, Manchester, Nottingham and Birmingham fare worst.

By the age of five, 73.6 per cent of children have had both doses in Liverpool, with a figure of 74.5 in Manchester, and 75.1 in Nottingham and Birmingham. Several of the figures have fallen dramatically in recent years, with Hackney down from almost 89.4 per cent uptake in 2014-15 to 56.4 per cent in 2022-23. In 2014-15, uptake in Birmingham was almost 10 points higher, with Manchester seeing a fall of 13.1 percentage points since then, and a drop of 11.1 percentage points in Nottingham.

Across the country, GP practices have been asked to recall anyone ages one to five who has not been vaccinated, and to accept jab requests for older children and young people up to the age of 25.

Official figures show that uptake of the vaccine is at its lowest point in over a decade.

Dr Ronny Cheung, officer for health services at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health said “vaccine hesitancy” and vaccine “fatigue” since the pandemic were among reasons parents were proving slower to come forward.

“Some people just don’t want to talk about vaccines any more when we talk about them,” he said, adding that “a lot of people” had forgotten about the potential risks of measles.

Health chiefs have declared a “national incident” because of the disease’s spread in the West Midlands. The outbreak is thought to be the biggest single outbreak in England for decades.

MMR uptake has worsened since Covid after school closures, the diversion of vaccinators to administer Covid jabs and increased “anti-vaxx” sentiment. Latest published figures for England show uptake is 83.8 per cent nationally against 88.3 per cent in 2014.