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Y. Tony Yang, Shalinee Bhoobun, Taha Itani, Kathryn H. Jacobsen, Europe Should Consider Mandatory Measles Immunization for School Entry, Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society, Volume 5, Issue 3, September 2016, Pages 319–322, https://doi.org/10.1093/jpids/piw003
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Disneyland has marketed itself as being the happiest place on Earth, but in early 2015 it became the focal point for a measles outbreak that spread across much of the United States [ 1 ]. Thousands of people were exposed to 1 of the more than 100 individuals diagnosed with measles, including more than 20 children and adults who were intentionally unvaccinated [ 1 ]. This newsworthy event was relatively inconsequential compared to the number of measles cases in Europe in recent years. More than 30 000 cases were diagnosed across the World Health Organization European Region in 2013, with more than 1000 cases each in Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom (UK), and several other countries [ 2 ]. England and Wales alone had more than 1000 confirmed cases during an outbreak in 2012–2013, with the incidence rates highest among older children and adolescents who had missed childhood vaccinations [ 3 ]. Large-scale emergency vaccination campaigns were rolled out across the UK in an attempt to protect the population and curtail the outbreak [ 4 ]. This previously eliminated virus is now at the forefront of every British clinician's mind when assessing a child with a rash.
