Analysis of the Auckland 2014 measles outbreak indicates that adolescents and young adults could benefit from catch-up vaccination
Gary Reynolds, Cassandra Dias, Simon Thornley, Ronald King, Anne Morrison, Angela Matson, Richard Hoskins
A single child with measles at a high school would almost certainly cause a serious outbreak, because immunity in that age group is well below the national average. The rate of immunity in New Zealand is close to 95%, which suggests a high level of herd immunity, but the level of immunity among secondary school age children is between 65 per cent and 80 per cent. One of the reasons is that a controversial study linking the measles mumps and rubella vaccine to autism - later proven to be false - persuaded many parents not to vaccinate their children at that time. That means they remain vulnerable today, especially while gathered together at school. They would benefit greatly from national, targeted vaccination catch-up.
