A rapidly expanding measles outbreak in Bangladesh has claimed the lives of hundreds of children within a matter of months, with health authorities reporting more than 60,000 suspected cases since the start of the year. The surge has overwhelmed health facilities in several districts and prompted urgent calls from international health organisations for emergency vaccination support.
Scale of the Outbreak
Bangladesh recorded the alarming milestone of 60,000 suspected measles cases in just over two months — a figure that health officials describe as deeply troubling given the country’s historically strong vaccination infrastructure. The outbreak is concentrated in several densely populated regions, including parts of Dhaka, Chittagong, and Sylhet divisions, where community health workers say they have been stretched to breaking point responding to the surge in seriously ill children.
Hospital wards across affected areas have been forced to operate beyond capacity, with paediatric units reporting severe shortages of the supportive care resources needed to manage complications of measles, including pneumonia, encephalitis, and severe diarrhoea. These conditions disproportionately affect malnourished children, and malnutrition remains a persistent challenge in parts of the country, significantly raising the risk of measles becoming fatal.
Vaccination Gaps at the Root
Public health experts point to a decline in routine immunisation coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic as a key factor driving the current crisis. During lockdowns and periods of health service disruption between 2020 and 2022, hundreds of thousands of children in Bangladesh missed scheduled vaccinations, creating a large susceptible population. Measles is one of the most contagious infectious diseases known, capable of spreading to approximately nine out of ten unvaccinated individuals exposed to it.
The World Health Organization and UNICEF had warned since 2021 that the global decline in childhood immunisation coverage during the pandemic would trigger outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases, and Bangladesh is among a growing number of countries where those warnings are proving accurate. Similar outbreaks have been reported across parts of Africa and Southeast Asia in recent years.
Government and International Response
The Bangladeshi government has declared the outbreak a public health emergency and launched emergency supplementary immunisation activities targeting children under the age of five in the worst-affected districts. Health Ministry officials confirmed that over two million doses of measles vaccine have been deployed in recent weeks, with mobile vaccination teams working in schools, markets, and rural communities to close immunity gaps.
The World Health Organization has dispatched a rapid response team to support the national effort and is coordinating with UNICEF and the Gavi vaccine alliance to ensure an adequate supply of vaccines. Child rights advocates have called on the government to urgently address underlying vulnerabilities — including chronic malnutrition and barriers to routine healthcare — warning that without addressing these root causes, future outbreaks remain a serious risk even after the current crisis is brought under control.
