{"id":255891,"date":"2023-03-31T14:23:30","date_gmt":"2023-03-31T12:23:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/40-new-measles-cases-recorded\/"},"modified":"2023-03-31T14:23:30","modified_gmt":"2023-03-31T12:23:30","slug":"40-new-measles-cases-recorded","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/40-new-measles-cases-recorded\/","title":{"rendered":"40 new measles cases recorded"},"content":{"rendered":"
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South Africa has recorded 40 new laboratory-confirmed measles cases in the past week, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) said on Friday.<\/p>\n

According to the NICD, it has tested 5 335 serum samples for measles since the outbreak last year, 865 of which (16%) were confirmed positive.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the public health institute said the percentage of samples testing positive (PTP) decreased from 22% of 255 samples tested in the previous week, compared to 14% of 214 samples last week.<\/p>\n

Sporadic cases were reported in all nine provinces in South Africa in 2022.<\/p>\n

However, as of 25 March 2023, measles outbreaks were declared in eight provinces, except for the Eastern Cape.<\/p>\n

The outbreak was first declared in Limpopo in October 2022.<\/p>\n

In the past week, the NICD said, no new cases were reported in Mpumalanga, Northern Cape, and Western Cape.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe measles strain detected in Limpopo and the North West is genotype D8, similar to the strain in Zimbabwe in the 2022 outbreak,\u201d the institute said.<\/p>\n

In the provinces, the most affected age groups are still the five to nine-year-olds (43%), with a considerable proportion of cases among children aged between one and four (24%) and those aged between 10 and 14 (19%).<\/p>\n

The institution said vaccination campaigns should also include children aged 10 to 14.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the majority of cases (68%) were reported from primary healthcare facilities, and the highest proportion of infections were detected in hospitals (55%) in children under the age of one.<\/p>\n

According to the NICD, there are suggestions that the infection incidence is likely increasing.<\/p>\n

In Limpopo, Greater Sekhukhune and Waterberg drive the peak, while Ekurhuleni Municipality pushes the numbers in Gauteng.<\/p>\n

In contrast, the numbers in Mpumalanga and the North West suggest infection incidence is likely decreasing.<\/p>\n

A virus in the paramyxovirus family, which infects the respiratory tract, and then spreads throughout the body, causes measles.<\/p>\n

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), measles is a human disease not known to occur in animals.<\/p>\n

It can lead to major epidemics with significant morbidity and mortality, especially among vulnerable people.<\/p>\n

These include young and malnourished children, pregnant women and immunocompromised individuals, including those with HIV, cancer or treated with immunosuppressive.<\/p>\n

Measles can cause serious complications, including ear infections, severe diarrhoea, blindness, encephalitis, pneumonia, and death.<\/p>\n

Members of the public are urged to ensure their children are vaccinated against measles. \u2013 SAnews.gov.za<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa has recorded 40 new laboratory-confirmed measles cases in the past week, the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD) said on Friday. According to the NICD, it has tested 5 335 serum samples for measles since the outbreak last year, 865 of which (16%) were confirmed positive. Meanwhile, the public health institute said the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":255892,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[38678],"class_list":{"0":"post-255891","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-south-africa","8":"tag-sanews","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/40-new-measles-cases-recorded.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}