Table 1
Summary of studies reporting post‑measles complications—Study characteristics and reported incidence.
| COMPLICATION CATEGORY | AUTHOR (YEAR) [REF] | STUDY DESIGN | COUNTRY | SETTING | POPULATION | SAMPLE SIZE (N) | COMPLICATION | INCIDENCE / PERCENTAGE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Respiratory complications | Ammar et al. (2026) [41] | Cross‑sectional study | Iraq | Pediatric hospital | Children with confirmed measles | 200 | Otitis Media (OM) | 45% |
| Ilyas et al. (2020) [42] | Retrospective descriptive study | Pakistan | Tertiary care hospital, Peshawar | Children with measles (early childhood) | 100 | Otitis Media (OM) | 6% | |
| Tolera et al. (2025) [43] | Cross‑sectional study | Ethiopia | Jimma University Medical Center | Children hospitalized with suspected measles | 250 | Pneumonia | 82% | |
| Neurological complications | Ali Deeba et al. (2020) [44] | Review paper with literature‑derived estimate | LMICs | Hospital (case in Belgium) | Non‑vaccinated patient with measles | NA | Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis (ADEM) | ~1 per 1,000 measles cases |
| Garg and Pandey (2025) [45] | Narrative literature review | LMICs (multi‑country) | Community/hospital (pooled) | Measles‑affected general population | NA | Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis (SSPE) | 27.9 per 100,000 measles cases | |
| Ocular complications | Sauter (1976) [46] | Observational study | Kenya | Hospital | Measles patients | 267 | Measles‑associated Keratoconjunctivitis | 87.6% (234/267) |
| Foster and Sommer (1987) [47] | Prospective cohort study | Tanzania | Hospital/community | Children with measles | 130 | Corneal Ulceration | 37% | |
| Sandford‑Smith and Whittle (1979) [48] | Retrospective study | Nigeria | Hospital | Children with measles | 89 | Corneal Ulceration | 42% | |
| Animashaun (2024) [49] | Retrospective observational study | Nigeria | Hospital | Children with measles | 2772 | Measles‑associated Blindness (ocular complications) | 1% (29/2,772) | |
| CONFLICT‑AFFECTED COUNTRIES | ||||||||
| Complications | Masters et al. (2023) [50] | Descriptive epidemiological outbreak investigation | USA | US military resettlement bases (Afghan evacuees) | Afghan evacuees under humanitarian interventions | 47 | Diarrhea | 53% |
| Otitis Media | 6% | |||||||
| Pneumonia | 6% | |||||||
[i] Abbreviations: NA = Not Applicable; ADEM = Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis; SSPE = Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis; LMICs = Low‑ and Middle‑Income Countries.
[ii] Note: Because included studies vary markedly in design, study population, setting, sample size, and case definitions, reported percentages represent heterogeneous data and cannot be directly compared across studies or pooled as uniform incidence estimates.