In connection with the European Immunization Week, ECDC releases data indicating an increase in cases of vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles and pertussis, after decreased levels during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A number of European countries (including Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Sweden and the United Kingdom) indicate an increase seen during 2022, particularly since September 2022, in the number of cases of invasive Group A Streptococcus (iGAS) disease among children less than ten years of age.
Fanny Chereau, EPIET fellow from cohort 2016, was deployed with GOARN (Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network) to support the response to the plague outbreak in Madagascar, on October 2017.
Since 23 August 2017 there is an ongoing epidemic of plague in Madagascar. As of 20 October 2017 WHO has reported 1 365 cases and 106 deaths leading to 8 % case fatality. Nine hundred and fifteen (67%) cases are pneumonic plague cases. The high proportion of pneumonic plague among cases is of concern, indicating that droplet transmission is a driver of the spread of plague in Madagascar beyond the areas that have been considered as endemic for bubonic plague to date. In the last weeks, the number of new confirmed cases seem to be plateauing, indicating that the outbreak is gradually being controlled.
Prompted by the increase of hantavirus activity in Europe observed in 2012, ECDC report reviewed the preventive measures and communication strategies in European countries.
This letter to the editor raises the issue of the adaptation of B. pertussis to vaccine selection pressure as one of the reasons for the increase number of cases of whooping cough reported in several countries.
The study design and analysis controlled for influence of potentially confounding trends, such as improvement of day-care carriage and decreasing prevalence of smoking during the study period.
The authors assess the risk of pertussis in children in California relative to the time since the fifth dose of DTaP from 2006 to 2011 (this period included a large outbreak in 2010).