MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Hawa Nor carried her visibly
weakened son into the hospital’s isolation ward. Like many sick children
here, the 7-year-old boy is likely a victim of an old Somali wives’
tale: A child with measles should be kept inside, and away from the
doctor, for a week.
Abdullahi Hassan labored to breathe, and his eyesight is deteriorating.
"Even though we kept him at home for a week, he’s getting weaker," Nor tells the pediatrician.

Somalia
is suffering from an outbreak of measles that the World Health
Organization and the U.N. children’s agency labels "extremely alarming."
UNICEF reported 1,350 suspected cases of measles in March and April, a
figure four times higher than the same period last year. Another 1,000
cases were reported in May.
Many children in the country are
malnourished and few have access to medical care, making an outbreak
potentially dangerous for thousands of others. One additional danger
that prevents early medical intervention is the belief by many parents
that they should keep measles-infected children at home for a week for
what they call an "incubation" period.
"Such delays cause clinical
problems, including respiratory disorders, and in some cases they bring
children malnourished who cannot survive without ventilation," Dr. Omar
Abdi, a pediatrician at Banadir Hospital in Mogadishu, said in an
interview on Tuesday.
Though mostly eradicated in the United
States, measles remains a common disease in many parts of Asia, the
Pacific and Africa because of a lack of vaccinations. Even the U.S.,
where the disease has technically been eliminated, has seen a record
number of measles cases this year. The Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention says the country has nearly 400 reported cases, more than
twice as many as in all of 2013 and eight times as many as in all of
2012.
The measles is spreading in a handful of U.S. communities
where pockets of unvaccinated people are found, the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention says.
In Somalia, the disease is
spreading because of a lack of medical facilities. A measles vaccination
costs only about $1, but millions of children remain exposed to the
disease. Hunger and bad health add to the problem.
"We have a very
high number of malnourished Somali children," said Sikander Khan, the
UNICEF Somalia representative. "Malnourished children here are more
susceptible to disease and are more likely to die or suffer lifelong
disability such as blindness, deafness or brain damage as a result of
contracting measles."
The World Health Organization says about 330
people, mostly children, die from measles every day globally. The
Philippines is suffering from a severe outbreak this year. WHO says the
country has about 40,000 cases.
The signs and symptoms of measles
include inflamed eyes, a cough, sore throat, fever and a red, blotchy
skin rash. There is no specific treatment for measles except to relieve
symptoms with medications. But malnourished children are more likely to
have severe cases and develop life-threating complications like
pneumonia.
In Somalia, the belief that treatment should be delayed
sometimes causes rifts inside families. Halimo Hussein brought her
4-year-old girl into the hospital after defying her husband’s order to
keep her child home for at least a week.
"I’m here against his will," she said. "He even threatened me with divorce for defying
him."
Two
decades of conflict has devastated Somalia’s health sector. An
estimated one in five children dies before his or her fifth birthday,
and measles is one of the main causes. Vaccination in areas controlled
by al-Shabab militants is difficult. Health officials estimated only 15
percent of children there are protected against the disease.
The
World Health Organization and UNICEF say a nationwide campaign to
vaccinate about 5 million children at a cost of $9 million needs to be
conducted to prevent thousands of avoidable deaths.