Background: An outbreak of measles was declared in southern Alberta on October 18, 2013, after a case had been reported to the local public health unit in a non-immunized teenager with recent travel to the Netherlands. The teenager had had contact with a large number of unimmunized people while infectious; therefore, the risk of spread was high. The potential for an outbreak of measles in this area had been identified by the lead Medical Officer of Health for South Zone, and planning for an outbreak had begun in August 2013.
Background: Southern Alberta is home to many unique homogeneous communities that typically educate their children in private schools. A number of these communities do not promote immunization as a preventive public health measure, although the reasons behind this vary. People within these communities keep themselves somewhat secluded from other populations and thus do not benefit from overall herd immunity. This has led to frequent outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases in private schools affiliated with these homogeneous religious communities.
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