Mothers’ mental health ‘causes kids to miss jabs’

AT LEAST 5,000 children in the UK miss out on potentially lifesaving vaccines every year because their mothers have mental health problems, research has revealed.

Conditions such as depression, anxiety and eating disorders leave mothers less likely to attend routine appointments where injections are given to protect under-fives against measles, mumps, rubella, whooping cough and diphtheria.

The Manchester University team tracked almost 480,000 families over 12 years and found infants whose mothers had psychiatric struggles were 14 per cent less likely to get all their jabs than those whose mothers were healthy. Dr Cemre Su Osam, from the university’s Centre for Women’s Mental Health, who co-authored the study, said the findings were a ‘public health concern’.