PhD Thesis - ResearchSpace@Auckland - The University of Auckland

measles. 16 In Australia, there were 183 deaths from measles from 1957 to 1966. 17
In the same period in New Zealand, hospitals reported admitting a total of 1929 cases
of measles. 18 Analysis of hospital discharges for the epidemic years from 1949 to
1969 showed that nearly 60 percent of cases were in the under five-year-old category,
with over 22 percent of cases for the five to tens. 19 With a predominant number of
cases occurring amongst young children, the Health Department monitored measles
vaccine development in the United States with interest.
Measles vaccine was first licensed in the United States in 1963 after years of research
to produce an attenuated, live vaccine. The United States initially adopted this
vaccine with great enthusiasm in the 1960s with more than ten million doses being
given to children between 1963 and 1965. 20 In 1967, the Center for Disease Control
announced that measles could be eradicated from the United States by targeting up to
95 percent of the child population in a series of mass immunisation campaigns by the
end of the year. 21 From 1966 to 1968, 19.5 million doses of measles vaccines were
given out as part of measles eradication programmes. 22 Accordingly, there was a
substantial reduction in the numbers of cases of measles; by 1968 the reported
incidence was 22,231 cases, less than five percent of the 1962 total of 481,530. 23
The United States campaign against measles reduced disease incidence by using
several methods. These included, the use of mass immunisation campaigns to
immunise all children under one and those of school-entry not previously immunised;
the provision of highly publicised and specialised clinics, free vaccine and birth
certificate follow-up programmes to make sure that all were immunised. 24 At the
beginning of the campaign in 1962, trials indicated that the public was in favour of the
16 ibid. Cliff, Haggett and Smallman-Raynor have used reported cases.
17 B. Feery, ‘Impact of immunization on disease patterns in Australia’, Medical Journal of Australia,
(MJA), 2, 1981, p.175.
18 R. M. Cullen, W. J. Walker, ‘Measles epidemics 1949-91: the impact of mass immunisation in New
Zealand’, New Zealand Medical Journal, (NZMJ), 109, 1039, 1996, p.401.
19 ibid. The epidemic years for measles were 1949, 1952, 1954, 1959, 1963, 1965, 1967 and 1969.
20 A. Cliff, P. Haggett, M. Smallman-Raynor, Measles. A Historical Geography, p.219.
21 J. P. Baker, ‘Immunization and the American Way: 4 childhood vaccines’, American Journal of
Public Health, 2000, 90, 2, p.205.
22 A. Cliff, P. Haggett, M. Smallman-Raynor, Measles. A Historical Geography. pp.219-20.
23 ibid., p.220.
24 ibid., pp.219-21.
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