A measles outbreak in Bangladesh has killed 512 children since March 15, according to health department figures published on Saturday, making it the most fatal surge the country has witnessed in decades. At least 86 of those deaths were confirmed measles infections, while another 426 children died with symptoms consistent with the disease, health officials said. The death toll continued to rise on Saturday, with 13 children dying in the past 24 hours alone.
Health authorities have identified 62,507 suspected measles cases nationwide and 8,494 laboratory-confirmed infections between March 15 and May 23, data from the Directorate General of Health Services showed.
Hospitals in the capital Dhaka have been overwhelmed with cases. They have set up dedicated wards but lack sufficient numbers of intensive care beds. Cases have spread rapidly in recent months, placing severe strain on already fragile healthcare services, particularly in rural districts and densely populated low-income urban areas.
Most cases reported during the ongoing outbreak have been among children aged between six months and five years. Doctors say many of the children arriving at hospitals were already critically ill.
“Though measles is highly contagious, a healthy baby with no complications can survive with minimal medication,” Ainul Islam Khan, a paediatrician at Dhaka’s Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College and Hospital, told AFP. “Here, most children came to the hospital with respiratory distress and infections in the eyes, throat and lungs.”
Bangladesh, a South Asian nation of 175 million people, has rolled out a mass vaccination drive to combat the outbreak. UNICEF country chief Rana Flowers said this week the campaign has reached 18 million children.
“The good news is 18 million children have been reached with measles vaccination,” Flowers told reporters.
Zahid Raihan, spokesman for the health department, said there were signs of improvement in the worst-affected areas, even if the full impact of the vaccinations would take time to be felt.
The government had declared the outbreak contained earlier in May, pointing to a decline in cases in several previously hard-hit districts. The new tally on Saturday indicates that deaths have continued despite that assessment.
UNICEF said on Wednesday that gaps in immunisation worsened during and after the chaos of the 2024 student-led uprising that toppled the government, leaving large numbers of children unprotected. The World Health Organisation said last month that declining routine immunisation coverage had increased the risk of a large-scale outbreak.
Measles has no specific treatment once contracted. It is a highly contagious viral disease that spreads through coughs and sneezes and can cause severe complications including pneumonia, brain inflammation and death, particularly among malnourished or unvaccinated children. It remains one of the leading causes of vaccine-preventable child deaths worldwide.
Between 2000 and 2020, Bangladesh achieved significant success in its immunisation programmes, bringing the country close to eliminating measles entirely. Over the preceding five years, countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Yemen, Nigeria and India typically ranked highest for measles-related deaths. The scale and speed of the 2026 Bangladesh outbreak has drawn comparisons to crises in those nations, with international health observers calling it one of the worst the region has witnessed in a decade.
A policy brief published on Thursday by the Global Antibiotic Resistance Partnership warned that vaccination gaps could worsen antimicrobial resistance in Bangladesh. UNICEF stressed the need to boost vaccination programmes and increase funding for health facilities, surveillance and data systems going forward.
The health department said the full impact of the ongoing vaccination campaign would take months to materialise. The nationwide immunisation campaign was described by UNICEF as a response to what the agency called a preventable disaster. Authorities have not confirmed a timeline for when active case numbers are expected to fall to pre-outbreak levels, and daily deaths continued to be recorded as of Saturday.
