Measles outbreak kills dozens in war-torn East Darfur, vaccines delayed

A measles outbreak in East Darfur has turned war, displacement and the collapse of basic health services into a deadly child-health emergency. In Labado, Hawa Adam said her 2-year-old son, Ali, fell sick on February 25 and died after she assumed it was an ordinary childhood illness, only to find there was no vaccination, no qualified doctor and almost no reliable care.

Local officials and community leaders said the disease spread across Labado in March and April, reaching 12 residential neighborhoods in a population of about 12,000. Their counts put the death toll at about 70, with roughly 1,000 infections. East Darfur’s health director disputed those figures, saying he could confirm 300 cases and 26 deaths across four districts. Darfur24 had already reported on April 6 that Labado had at least 59 deaths, 350 confirmed infections and 702 suspected cases, underscoring both the scale of the outbreak and the difficulty of collecting accurate data in a war zone.

The delay in vaccines deepened the crisis. Doses arrived from Chad on April 11 through UNICEF, and a vaccination campaign was scheduled for April 18 to 24 across East Darfur and the wider state. That delay mattered because measles is among the most contagious diseases in the world and is especially dangerous for malnourished children. The World Health Organization says there is no specific treatment, making prevention and rapid vaccination the only reliable defense.

The outbreak unfolded inside a broader collapse of immunization. UNICEF launched a measles-rubella catch-up campaign in Darfur on January 7, targeting 6 million children ages 9 months to under 15 years after measles vaccine coverage in Sudan fell to 46% and routine DTP1 coverage dropped to 48% in 2024. East Darfur was scheduled for the first phase from February 22 to 27, with remaining localities in North and South Darfur set for April. Doctors Without Borders said in December that more than 1,300 measles cases had already been recorded in facilities it supported in Darfur since September 2025.

The wider health system has been buckling under three years of war. On April 14, the World Health Organization said Sudan had the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, with 34 million people needing aid, 21 million lacking health services and 37% of health facilities non-functional. More than 4 million people were estimated to be acutely malnourished in 2026, and WHO said disease outbreaks including measles were widespread across Darfur and other states. WHO has also documented at least 217 verified attacks on health care since April 15, 2023, including an attack on El Daein Teaching Hospital in East Darfur that killed at least 64 people and rendered the hospital non-functional. In Labado, the virus spread where war, hunger and the collapse of medical care left children exposed and unprotected.