136 deaths and 8400 patients since January in a measles epidemic in the Philippines

Volunteers from the National Red Cross and the Philippines Department of Health are carrying out door-to-door measles immunization in an informal settler community in Manila, Philippines. (AP Photo)

Manila, Philippines): According to the Philippines Health Secretary, 136 people, mostly children, have died of measles and another 8,400 have fallen ill during an epidemic due in part to recent fears related to vaccination.

Health Secretary Francisco Duque III announced Monday that a mbadive vaccination campaign that had begun last week in Manila and four heavily affected provincial regions could contain the epidemic outbreak. here april. President Rodrigo Duterte warned Friday in a televised message of life-threatening complications and urged children to be vaccinated. The epidemic began in January.

Duque said a government information campaign was helping to restore public confidence in its vaccination program, which was tainted in 2017 by a dengue vaccine manufactured by the French manufacturer Sanofi, accused of the death of at least three children.