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The World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) said Tues­day that while child­hood im­mu­ni­sa­tion in the Amer­i­c­as, in­clud­ing the Caribbean, has shown en­cour­ag­ing signs of re­cov­ery last year, sig­nif­i­cant gaps re­main.

Ac­cord­ing to the new da­ta re­leased by the World Health Or­gan­i­sa­tion (WHO) and UNICEF, over 1.4 mil­lion chil­dren did not re­ceive a sin­gle dose of the diph­the­ria, tetanus, and per­tus­sis (DTP)-con­tain­ing vac­cine, mark­ing an in­crease in so-called “ze­ro-dose” chil­dren.

The find­ings are part of the 2024 WHO and UNICEF Es­ti­mates of Na­tion­al Im­mu­ni­sa­tion Cov­er­age (WUENIC), which show that while glob­al child­hood vac­ci­na­tion cov­er­age has large­ly sta­bilised, near­ly 20 mil­lion chil­dren world­wide missed at least one DTP vac­cine dose, in­clud­ing 14.3 mil­lion ze­ro-dose chil­dren.