MPH’s Schaffner: Amish community measles outbreak case study for comprehensive vaccination
With measles remaining endemic in most of the world and global travel a part of everyday life, unvaccinated communities in the U.S. remain at risk from the highly infectious and sometimes deadly illness, a recent analysis suggested.
The report, appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine, focused on the 2014 measles outbreak affecting Amish communities in Ohio. Two members of the sect returned to Ohio after performing typhoon relief work in the Philippines, unknowingly bringing the disease with them. Ultimately, 383 people in their communities, in which vaccination rates were much lower than among non-Amish people in the same areas, came down with measles.
William Schaffner, MD, of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, described the article as "an absolutely elegant demonstration of what we need to know."