Johannesburg — Since 2009 southern Africa is tackling a serious epidemic of measles which has already taken 758 lives, mainly in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Namibia, Lesotho and South Africa.

According to a statement issued by the World Health Organisation Support Coordinator for eastern and southern Africa, as many as 95% of children with a right to vaccination against measles, have not been vaccinated.

A UNICEF statement said that in 2009 more than 2.4 million children in eastern and southern Africa, about 20% of all children fewer than 12 months, were not immunised according to the normal procedure which consists of two doses of vaccine. Southern Africa is not the only region affected by a drop in the number of children vaccinated against measles.

In order to guarantee immunity, WHO recommends that at least 90% of all children in every district and at the national level, be vaccinated, according to the normal procedure. Global levels of vaccination dropped by 72% in 2000 but coverage rose again to 83% in 2008.

The ignorance of the epidemic in southern Africa in could be partly attributed to members of certain religious sects who do not believe in "modern western medicine" and refuse to have their children vaccinated. According to the media in Malawi, members of the Seventh Day Adventists Church refuse to have their children vaccinated against measles.