Unvaxxed and vulnerable

Mothers and babies waiting for shots in Accra, Ghana. About 60 million ‘zero-dose children’ have not received any vaccines and have aged out of routine immunisation programmes. Protecting them will require a costly vaccination blitz. — ©2023 The New York Times Company

LARGE outbreaks of diseases that primarily kill children are spreading around the world, a grim legacy of disruptions to health systems during the Covid-19 pandemic that have left more than 60 million children without a single dose of standard childhood vaccines.

By midway through this year, 47 countries were reporting serious measles outbreaks, compared with 16 countries in June 2020.