Bangladesh is battling to contain the world’s worst measles outbreak, a crisis fuelled by weak data, inadequate outreach and vaccination gaps that experts say offers a stark warning to other nations. The country’s routine vaccination programme faltered in 2025, and the Bangladesh measles outbreak has since grown into the largest reported anywhere in the world this year. This is a real warning to every country, said Mark Jit, a World Health Organization vaccine adviser and professor at New York University’s School of Global Public Health. The findings, reported from Sylhet by Reuters journalists Ruma Paul, Jennifer Rigby, Sam Jahan and Zia Chowdhury, draw on WHO documents and interviews with more than a dozen scientists, health workers and officials.
The Scale of the Bangladesh Measles Outbreak
Bangladesh reported 202,000 suspected measles cases, 22,000 of them laboratory-confirmed, between the start of the outbreak in mid-March and October 9, according to the World Health Organization. That is more suspected cases than any other country this year. So far, 1,147 people have died of the highly contagious disease, with 94 per cent of reported deaths among children under five years old.
The figures illustrate how quickly measles can surge once immunisation coverage slips. The Bangladesh measles outbreak now dwarfs every other national outbreak recorded in 2026, and health workers on the ground describe hospitals and clinics struggling to cope with the influx of sick children.
For now, the Bangladesh measles outbreak stands as the world’s worst, and as a real warning to every country that takes high vaccination coverage for granted.