2024-01-22 17:42:20
London. In the selfie currently making the rounds in the British media, six-year-old Samuel presses his face tightly against his mother’s. They both laugh happily into the camera. With the photo from happy days, the British Gemma Larkman-Jones wants to draw attention to the fate of her son and how the catastrophe could have been prevented. “I don’t want other parents to have to go through this,” she said. Her son developed encephalitis after contracting measles and died in 2019 at the age of just six. He wasn’t vaccinated. “If people knew that something like this could happen, more children would be vaccinated,” the 45-year-old Londoner is convinced.
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It is no coincidence that Larkman-Jones is making her appeal to the public now. Because the situation in England is serious. Cases of measles have been increasing for months. The British health authority UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said around 200 cases and around 100 suspected cases have been reported since autumn, especially around Birmingham. But there were also outbreaks in some parts of London. According to David Elliman from London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital, dozens of deaths could occur if no further action is taken.
Conspiracy theories about measles vaccination
Measles spreads mainly in areas where vaccination rates are not high enough, says Jenny Harries, chief executive of the UKHSA. The number of primary school children who have received the MMR vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella in England is below the World Health Organization target of 95 percent. On average, only around 85 percent of children up to the age of five received two doses of the vaccine. According to the authorities, in London the rate is only 74 percent. In some districts such as Hackney in the north-east of the city, almost half of the children did not receive a second injection.
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British experts give various reasons for this. Some parents did not know that the NHS was also offering the triple vaccination during the pandemic, it was said; others had problems getting an appointment or underestimated the consequences of the illness. But conspiracy theories also played a role on the island. The British were particularly influenced by the doctor Andrew Wakefield, who has now been banned from practicing medicine. In the late 1990s, he claimed that the MMR vaccine could cause autism – a theory that was refuted by later studies.
Unlike in Germany, the vaccines offered as part of the national program are not mandatory in the Kingdom. “We do not require vaccinations in the UK. “We recommend that people have certain vaccinations and advise parents to protect their children against certain diseases,” child health expert Helen Bedford from University College London told the Guardian. The only vaccination ever required in the kingdom was against smallpox. “But the law was repealed in the 1940s,” Bedford said.
“My son didn’t have to die”
A campaign has now been launched in England to get the measles outbreak under control. Parents and carers of children between the ages of six and eleven should be encouraged to make an appointment with their family doctor so that the child can still receive the missed MMR combination. In addition, reminders were sent via SMS, email and letters, it said. Additionally, “unvaccinated people can also be immunized in schools and other locations,” says Steve Russell, director of immunizations and screening at NHS England.
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The late Samuel’s mother, Gemma Larkman-Jones, is calling on parents to take action given the situation. She hopes that they will realize how dangerous the consequences of the disease can be. “My son didn’t have to die. This is a guilt that I carry with me every day.”
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