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The pandemic has put a serious setback on global efforts to vaccinate children against diseases such as measles and polio. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported On Thursday, it reduced the worldwide coverage of some vaccines to levels not seen more than a decade ago.

The proportion of eligible children receiving the polio vaccine fell from 86 percent the previous year to 83 percent in 2020, as were those covered by the third dose of the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine known as DTP3. Measles vaccine coverage also fell slightly from 86 percent in 2019 to 84 percent last year.

These setbacks, while seemingly minor, have meant that during the pandemic, millions of children missed out on routine vaccinations, putting them and their communities at risk.

Globally, the approximately 23 million children targeted for the DTP3 vaccine were not vaccinated in 2020, compared to 19 million in 2019. Most of them had not received a single dose of diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine. The coverage of this vaccine has not been this low since 2009.

CDC scientists in the report called for action to address immune gaps in preventable diseases in countries already grappling with Covid outbreaks. Scientists from the World Health Organization and UNICEF were also co-authors of the study.

The decline in vaccines follows a decade of stagnant immunization levels. Measles deaths in 2019 rose to 23-year highs, a result of what public health experts describe as inadequate vaccine coverage. The pandemic has hampered tracking of measles outbreaks, the scientists said.

The CDC report said the pandemic has also disrupted immunization programs, disrupting the supply of essential vaccines and making them harder to implement.

According to the report, immunization levels for diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis and measles were the lowest in most of Africa. WHO also He said on Thursday that only five of Africa’s 54 countries It was expected to meet its year-end goal of vaccinating 40 percent of its population against Covid. UNICEF, a United Nations agency working to distribute coronavirus vaccines, has warned there will be a shortage of syringes for both Covid and routine vaccines next year.