'THINGS ARE PERILOUS RIGHT NOW': MEASLES CASES IN ALBERTA RISE TO 313; EXPERTS ENDORSE VACCINE
There are now 313 cases of measles in Alberta , 100 more than the number of cases reported last week.
The majority of Albertans diagnosed with the infection are children and teenagers, with 193 cases recorded for ages five to 17, and 93 for children younger than five years.
The latter are the ones who are most at risk of serious complications, particularly babies who are aged six to 12 months, said Dr. James Talbot, public health physician and the province’s former chief medical officer of health.
During a panel hosted by the Alberta Medical Association on Thursday, he urged Albertan families to move quickly on getting themselves and their children vaccinated, citing three reasons.
The first, he said, is that measles is widely known to be a highly contagious virus that spreads quickly. Secondly, he explained that because it often takes time for measles symptoms to show up, there are probably more cases of the infection in Alberta than what has been reported.
“And thirdly, the percentage of kids unimmunized or partially immunized is very high in Alberta,” he said.
The panel follows days after a provincial update on Monday, wherein Adriana LaGrange, the province’s health minister, and Dr. Sunil Sookram, Alberta’s interim chief medical officer of health, confirmed that actions are being taken to expand the provincial response to the outbreak.
It was attended by Talbot; AMA president Dr. Shelley Duggan; Dr. Tehseen Ladha, a pediatrician; and Dr. Lynora Saxinger, infectious disease specialist.
Actions entail expanding access to immunization by adding more appointment spots at clinics in the south and central zones, where the majority of the measles cases are reported.
As of Thursday, the south zone has reported 193 cases, while the central zone has reported 80 cases.
The panel, led by four of Alberta’s experts in infectious diseases and immunization, was intended to streamline everything there is to know about the outbreak, the risks of infection, who is vulnerable and to dispel concerns about taking the MMR vaccine, the only route to prevent infection.
“The measles vaccine is safe and it’s the best way to protect against it. It’s highly effective at preventing infection and complications,” said Dr. Shelley Duggan, AMA president.
Dispelling concerns around the MMR vaccine
Experts and doctors have pointed to the fall in immunization rates over the past two decades as a major reason for the measles outbreak. Anyone aged one and older can take the MMR vaccine, which immunizes against measles, mumps and rubella, and community protection against the infections means ensuring that at least 95 per cent of the population is vaccinated.
However, vaccination records show that just below 70 per cent of the population was vaccinated in the past two decades, which puts a significant chunk of the population at risk of infection and transmission of the virus.
“There’s no known effective treatment for measles, but there is a safe and effective measles vaccine,” said Dr. Tehseen Ladha.
She said she often sees families in the clinic who have questions about the vaccine. “And I empathize with them because there is a lot of false information out there,” she said, “and they don’t know what to believe.”
The problem with misinformation, Saxinger added, is that a person doesn’t have to believe every bit of false information around the vaccine to decide against taking it.
“They just have to hesitate,” she said. “So if you see something frequently, you might just start to accept that it might be true and that’s just a psychological fact. And if you’re even a little bit open to believing it, you might hesitate to make the vaccine appointment.”
Anyone can fall for it, even “smart people,” she added. “There are very smart, sophisticated people who get drawn into vaccine disinformation and conspiracy theories and they can come up with even smarter ways to justify believing in something not supported by real-world evidence.”
She called for a need to “vaccinate” oneself against misinformation, by staying vigilant to legitimate-appearing sources on social media, posts that take information out of context, fringe experts and information that uses a “shocking or tragic story.”
“It’s important to recognize signs like this of poor quality information and use official information sources backed by real public health experts and physicians in that field,” she said.
One of the most common questions heard from patients and families is whether there is a link between autism and the vaccine, according to Duggan.
No, there isn’t, according to Ladha.
The rumour came about from a single study conducted in the 1990s that demonstrated a potential link between the two. The study was later found to be fraudulent and the author was made to retract the study.
Numerous studies done since to explore the connection have found nothing and statistics on the rate of autism in vaccinated and unvaccinated children demonstrate no correlation, she said.
“I want to reassure families that once again, this is a safe vaccine and there should not be a fear of a consequence of autism because that has been disproven many times,” she said.
Children especially at risk
The vaccines become especially important to protect children from infection, who Ladha said are “uniquely” vulnerable.
For one, children can only get immunized against the infection after they’ve reached 12 months of age, she said. Secondly, they have a high risk of “serious illness or hospitalization.”
“Some of these outcomes we’ve heard can be things like dehydration and pneumonia, but in other cases children can get brain inflammation, encephalitis and this can cause long-term disability in children,” she said. “So we’re looking at children having blindness, seizures, brain damage, lasting effects from contracting the measles virus.”
Statistically, 10 to 30 per cent of children who contract the virus will be hospitalized, she said.
Related
As of May 3, 19 people are reported hospitalized from the infection. That’s eight more than reported on April 26.
According to Talbot, three children are currently hospitalized in the intensive care unit with the virus.
In the provincial update on Monday, the government announced that they were opening up vaccination to children aged six to 12 months in certain parts of the province, which Ladha recommended taking advantage of.
“Get your babies immunized before they are exposed,” she said.
‘It’s not too late to do something’
Experts agree that the situation is “perilous.”
“We’re happy that the government has now started to speak up about measles,” Duggan said. “I think they understand that things are perilous right now and that we could start to see those numbers rise dramatically.”
Talbot described the growth of cases in the province as being on the shaft of a hockey stick. “You really want to try to do as much work as you can before you get to that period, because with more cases, it requires more effort,” he said.
“We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t concerned,” he said, about the rise in cases in the province.
Medical literature states that for every 1,000 cases of measles, one can expect one to three deaths. “We’re here because we don’t want to be in that situation,” he said.
According to Health Minister Adriana LaGrange on Monday, measles vaccinations between March 16 and April 20 were 67 per cent higher than the same time period last year. But some health zones are varying amounts below the required 95 per cent vaccination target.
And while there has been an uptick in the vaccination rate, it becomes a question of which age group is receiving the vaccines and whether that’s making a significant impact on decreasing infections.
Talbot compared the efficacy of a COVID-level response to wiping out the measles outbreak. “If we put enough resources and we immunized everyone who wanted their children immunized over the next week or two, we would start to see numbers plateau within two or three weeks,” he said.
“It’s not too late to do something. This is exactly the kind of thing that needs to be done and the better we do it, the sooner we can bring it under control.”
2025-05-08T22:59:07Z