Five more children died with measles-like symptoms in the 24 hours ending at 8:00am on Friday, bringing the country’s combined tally of confirmed and suspected measles-related deaths to 1,304 this year.

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) has classified the latest fatalities as suspected measles deaths.

With this, the total number of suspected measles deaths has reached 1,199, while confirmed deaths from measles have remained the same at 105.

A total of 1,271 new suspected measles cases were reported during the 24-hour period, pushing the cumulative number of suspected cases nationwide to 245,562.

Meanwhile, 148 new confirmed measles cases were recorded, bringing the total number of laboratory-confirmed infections to 25,028.

Since March 15 this year, a total of 219,247 patients with suspected measles have been hospitalised across the country, of whom 210,401 have recovered, according to DGHS data.