South Africa says 36% of infants unvaccinated in 2026

South Africa's health department said Thursday that 36% of children under one had received no vaccines this year to April, the country's lowest infant vaccination rate in years.

The department said the proportion of unvaccinated children under one had tripled from 12% in 2017 to 36% this year to April. It called for urgent action to halt the decline in immunisation and warned that hundreds of thousands of infants were at risk of life-threatening illnesses.

The department said South Africa had recorded more than 3,460 laboratory-confirmed measles cases since January, with outbreaks spreading across several provinces and most cases in children aged one to 14.

It also reported nearly 400 rubella cases among children in the same age group, as well as whooping cough infections and sporadic cases of diphtheria.

“The decline in routine immunisation rates has created a public health emergency characterised by childhood disease outbreaks,” the department said.

Department deputy director Nonhlanhla Fikile Ndlovu told AFP that anti-vaccination rhetoric was amplified during the Covid-19 pandemic, but that vaccination coverage had already been declining before then. She said young parents needed more awareness of the importance of vaccination.

Childhood vaccinations are not mandatory in South Africa. They are provided free of charge at public clinics, with the first vaccines administered at birth.