Measles kills 37 children in the northwest

Some 37 children have died and 44 others are undergoing treatment following a measles outbreak mid-December in northwestern Central African Republic (CAR), health officials reported on Tuesday. Another 55 children have recovered from the disease, state-owned Radio Centrafrique quoted the supervisor of a vaccination programme in Ouham Province, Marc Tina, as saying. Tina said health officials had confirmed the outbreak, and that the deaths were recorded in Gbanga Yanga area in Ouham, 350 km north of the capital, Bangui. He said the Ministry of Health had immunised 2,584 children against measles in Gbanga Yanga between 22 December 2003 and 3 January 3004. The first measles alert in Gbanga Yanga was launched mid-December when some 29 children were suspected to have died of it. Health officials in Bangui have been hesitant to confirm the outbreak, pending a report from an investigative team sent to Gbanga Yanga. A health ministry-UN World Health Organisation mission reached Bossongoa, 305 km north of Bangui, on Tuesday to support medical teams already in Gbanga Yanga. The Gbanga Yanga outbreak was the fourth in the north, where no immunisation campaign took place between October 2002 and March 2003, because of war. Measles outbreaks were reported in April 2003 in Paoua and in October in Bozoum, 506 km and 384 km northwest of Bangui respectively; and in Nere, 10 km south of Bossangoa in November. Following each outbreak, the Spanish medical charity Medicos Sin Fronteras intervened to treat those infected and to vaccinate children aged under 15 years.