Health Tokyo measles cases surge to last year’s total by mid-March

Japan's health authorities are warning of a rise in measles cases following recent outbreaks, including a cluster at a dining venue in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward.
Nine men in their 20s working at the same establishment were infected, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government said on Tuesday. The first case was confirmed on 27 February. None had recently travelled abroad.

Nationwide, 100 cases have been reported so far this year, a faster pace than last year's total of 265. Tokyo has recorded 19 cases, followed by Aichi with 18, and Kanagawa and Niigata with 10 each, according to the Japan Institute for Health Security. A separate outbreak in Aichi in mid-February infected 14 students, a teacher, and a contractor at a high school. The health ministry told municipalities and the Japan Medical Association last month to follow their required screening and reporting procedures. Measles is a Category 5 disease, requiring doctors to report cases immediately.

Measles is a highly contagious airborne disease, with a basic reproduction number of 12 to 18, meaning one person infected with measles can transmit the disease to 12 to 18 people, according to the ministry. That's far higher than the flu, for which the number is 1.2 to 2, and COVID-19, whose reproduction number is 2 to 3. Symptoms begin with high fever, sore throat, coughing and bloodshot eyes. The incubation period is about 10 to 12 days. Two to four days after symptoms emerge, rashes appear. The disease can also lead to severe conditions such as pneumonia, middle ear infection and encephalitis.

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Japan has been declared "measles-free" since 2015, a status that the World Health Organisation's regional bodies confer on countries where, backed by strong disease surveillance, there is no sustained local transmission of the same virus strain for at least a year. Many countries, including the U.K., Canada, Spain, and Austria, have recently lost such status due to surging infections.

They need a vaccine promotion campaign with celebrities and their children receiving the vaccine with a thumbs up!

Our kids/grandkids got the full palette of shots. But I seem to remember talk of a case or two at work years ago.

Not good.

Cases of measles are rising quickly in Japan, with this year already showing the second-fastest pace of infections in the past decade.
By mid-April, the number of reported cases had reached 299. Japan had previously been certified by the World Health Organisation in 2015 as having eliminated measles, meaning that no domestically acquired transmission of the virus had been confirmed for at least 3 years. The recent increase has therefore raised concern. Measles is highly contagious. Health experts say it spreads far more easily than influenza, sometimes estimated at around 10 times as infectious. The virus can remain in the air, and infection may occur simply from being in the same room as an infected person.

Symptoms usually appear about 10 days after infection. Fever, coughing, and a runny nose tend to come first, followed by a rash that spreads across the body. The disease can become severe. It is estimated to kill roughly one in every 1,000 patients, which is why authorities continue to treat it seriously.

According to the Japan Institute for Health Security, the cumulative number of cases had climbed to 299 by 12 April. At the same point last year, the figure stood at 78, so the total is now close to four times higher. The highest number recorded in the past 10 years was 744 cases in 2019. So far this year, this outbreak is tracking second only to that outbreak.

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Hm, and in the US:

You might remember those 'R' (reproduction values) that were used to explain the transmissibility of COVID. COVID-19's R value represents how many people one infected person passes the virus to on average. An R value above 1 means cases are growing, while below 1 means the outbreak is shrinking.

The basic reproduction number for measles is commonly cited between 12 and 18 in totally susceptible populations. This means one unvaccinated person with measles can infect, on average, 12 to 18 other people, highlighting its high transmissibility and need for 95% vaccination coverage to achieve herd immunity.

Vaccine doubters are complete idiots.