Columbus, CDC team up for measles prevention

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – More than a year after it was declared over, Columbus and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) continue to learn from the central Ohio measles outbreak which spanned from late 2022 to early 2023.

“It certainly was concerning, worrisome, brought with fear for families and patients," Dr. Akua Amponsah, a primary care physician with Nationwide Children's Hospital (NCH), said. 

Thirty-six of the 85 cases led to hospitalizations, according to numbers from Columbus Public Health (CPH); 94% of the cases hadn't received any dose of the MMR vaccine. Amponsah is one of many healthcare professionals hoping to increase vaccine coverage and confidence.

“It really did sort of highlight how important vaccinations are for children's health and how much of a responsibility it is for all of us, particularly in the medical profession, in our settings, to make sure that we are educating our families," she said.

A team from the CDC visited CPH last week to follow up on the outbreak and discuss ways to increase vaccine confidence.

“We’d been working with them remotely for several months now and they really wanted to come to our community to meet us face to face and meet with some of our community partners to see how we’re working collectively together to improve vaccine confidence and reduce vaccine hesitancy," CPH Commissioner Dr. Mysheika Roberts said.

She said CPH works closely with schools, NCH, and other community partners. Roberts said part of the goal is using what was learned last week and over the past year to help other communities. Amponsah, who also met with the CDC, shared a similar message.

“It’s more than just our city," Amponsah said. "Yes we’ve had this recent outbreak and so we certainly want to focus on some of the lessons learned here and hopefully those can be extrapolated to other communities around the country."