A national information campaign is urgently needed to protect children from measles

Editorial: Victoria Atkins, the health secretary, must act to raise take-up of the MMR vaccine

Not only is measles a serious illness – it is completely preventable (Getty)

Measles can kill. So far, there have been no deaths reported in the latest flare-up of the illness, which was more or less eliminated in this country eight years ago. But unless immunisation rates can be raised significantly, children will die. It is estimated that, since measles vaccinations were introduced in the United Kingdom in 1968, they have saved 4,500 lives.

That is why Professor Dame Jenny Harries, chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency, issued a “national call to action” this week. The outbreaks of 200 cases in the West Midlands and a further 100 suspected cases, plus a surge of cases in Greater London, are the inevitable consequence of vaccination rates falling as low as 81 per cent in some areas.

Official figures show that the take-up of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine nationally is at 84.5 per cent – its lowest point in more than a decade, and well below the target of 95 per cent.