Assessment of measles incidence, measles-related complications and hospitalisations during an outbreak in a southern Italian region.
A large measles epidemic occurred in 2002 in Campania, a region of southern Italy with inadequate vaccination coverage. We evaluated the burden of the outbreak in children <15 years of age using different data sources. The measles standardized incidence rate was 5,757/100,000, corresponding to 63,368 estimated cases (95% CI: 59,544--67,373). Measles virus strains were identified as belonging to the D7 genotype. The estimated complication rate was 7.6%. A total of 972 measles hospitalisations were detected, giving a hospitalisation rate of 88.3/100,000. Three deaths occurred. These results show that measles can still represent a serious health threat even in industrialized countries.
Ciofi Degli Atti
Marta Luisa
ML
Reparto Epidemiologia delle Malattie Infettive, Centro Nazionale di Epidemiologia Sorveglianza e Promozione della Salute, Istituto Superiore di Sanità, Viale Regina Elena 299, 00161 Rome, Italy. ciofi@iss.it
Filia
Antonietta
A
Massari
Marco
M
Pizzuti
Renato
R
Nicoletti
Loredana
L
D'Argenzio
Angelo
A
de Campora
Enrico
E
Marchi
Antonella
A
Lombardo
Assunta
A
Salmaso
Stefania
S
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004196:Disease Outbreaks; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D007223:Infant; D007558:Italy / Q000453:epidemiology; D008457:Measles / Q000150:complications* / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000401:mortality; D018103:Morbillivirus / Q000145:classification / Q000302:isolation & purification