Cases jump to 133 this year, prompting calls for urgent vaccination and awareness.
Rising measles cases in Australia have prompted a national health alert from the Australian Centre for Disease Control.
The ACDC this week revealed there had been 133 reported cases of measles across the country so far this year – the highest number for this time of the year since 2019.
Half of these cases have been in people aged 20 to 34 years. The ACDC highlighted NSW, Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia as jurisdictions of particular concern.
Western Australia has had the highest number of cases (48 as of 14 October) according to the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System, followed by Victoria (34 cases), NSW (28 cases) and Queensland (22 cases).
There were 57 cases of measles reported across Australia in 2024; 26 in 2023; and seven in 2022.
In a statement, the ACDC said most of the cases so far had been in people who had travelled overseas.
“There are measles outbreaks in many countries globally, including in countries Australians frequently travel to for holidays, to visit friends and relatives and for work,” it said.
Australian infectious diseases expert Associate Professor Paul Griffin said Australia was in a “very precarious position” when it came to measles control.
“Certainly, if this continues and we don’t do more to address it, we could really go past a tipping point where we see more and more, a little bit like the US experience,” he told Allergy & Respiratory Republic.
“Once you get to that point, the unfortunate reality is, you’ll start to see the serious complications; potentially even deaths. And we want to make sure that doesn’t happen in our country.”
Professor Griffin, director of Infectious Diseases at Mater Health Services in Brisbane and Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Queensland Medical School, welcomed the ACDC alert.
But he said more needed to be done from a public health perspective to raise awareness, improve vaccination rates and ensure appropriate testing was done to allow appropriate contact tracing and infection control measures.
“This requires a comprehensive solution, including alerting travellers beforehand, getting people boosted, if possible, and then making sure that people understand these risks and do all the right things if they’re potentially infected, including getting tested early upon their return,” he said.
“This is exactly where a CDC could really make a big impact if it was doing things really well. It’s great that that alert has come out, but I hope it’s being backed up with comprehensive solutions to try and address this issue.
“It’s definitely significant [the high numbers], and if we don’t do more, it’s only going to get worse.”
Professor Griffin said one of the most important messages around measles – apart from the need for vaccination and reporting – was its level of infectiousness.
“It’s literally the most infectious thing that we will see,” he said.
“A lot of people are aware of how infectious things like the flu and covid are, and this is far more infectious than both of those – to the point where you can be in the same room as a measles patient was in, even a few hours after they were there, and be infected.
“It is one that is truly airborne, so you can be not even in the same room, but just in a room that shares ventilation or an air conditioning circuit, and easily become infected.
“So that’s the biggest issue with measles, is it’s just so infectious, and I think people still underestimate that.”
The other challenge was complacency, he said.
“A lot of people say, ‘Oh, it’s harmless. Everyone had it as a kid.’ And while it may well be something that’s not all that significant for most people that are infected, the rate of serious complications is high enough that it causes big problems,” said Professor Griffin.
“One in 1000 to one in 10,000 will have the more serious manifestations, like pneumonia or even neurological issues. And that’s why we do need people to understand that it’s both very infectious, but also, in enough people, it is very serious.”
