Samoan government accused of ignoring measles vaccination advice
Samoan government is being accused of ignoring crucial vaccination advice from its own medical experts leading up to the deadly measles outbreak in 2019. It was an outbreak which killed 83 people in Samoa, most of them babies and young children. Two consecutive health reports – one a 2018 study and the other a commission of inquiry delivered early in 2019 – urged the government to conduct a mass vaccination drive, given the country's low herd immunity at the time. It took the government a further seven months to start rolling out a mass vaccination policy resembling those recommendations, but by then it was too late. RNZ Pacific's Koroi Hawkins has been following the story and spoke to RNZ's Worldwatch reporter Max Towle.