Vaccination rates for kids fall amid outbreak; WHO warns 'children will die' - WPIX 11 New York

Children will die if vaccinations are halted as the world focuses on the coronavirus pandemic, the World Health Organization warned Monday.

More than 20 diseases can be prevented with vaccines, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said. Each year, more than 116 million infants are vaccinated, but more than 13 million kids are not. Tedros said the number of children not being vaccinated is rising because of coronavirus.

“The tragic reality is children will die as a result," he said. "Children may be at relatively low risk from severe disease and death from COVID-19 but can be at high risk from other diseases that can be prevented with vaccines."

During the week of April 12, the administration of measles, mumps and rubella shots dropped by about 40 percent; diphtheria and whooping cough shots by 24 percent; and HPV vaccines by 62 percent as compared to the week of February 16, according to vaccine data from about 200 independent pediatric practices nationwide from the Physician’s Computer Company.

More than 1,200 cases of measles were reported in 30 states in 2019 with more than three-quarters of them linked to outbreaks in New York and New York City, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

Pediatricians are doing what they can to keep kids for sick visits away from kids in for well visits at their offices, Dr. Elizabeth Murray, a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics who works at the University of Rochester Medical Center, said. Some doctors are doing immunization shots in parking lots.

"The last thing we want in our nation, or in our world, is to have other infectious diseases rise up now," she said.

Kids get the bulk of their vaccines when they're in their first couple of years of life, Dr. Murray said. Doctors are working to make sure those still happen and they want worried parents to ask them questions to alleviate those concerns.

"They definitely don't want you to be avoiding care because of worries," she said.

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