Measles Outbreak of 2014 - Essay Example

The US has sufficient health structures in place and measles vaccines are usually given to people, so there have been lower measles cases as compared to cases in the rest of the world. From 1997, measles cases have ranged from 37 to 220. The cases have been reduced due to routine measles vaccine started in 1963 and MMR vaccine (1971). Before this intervention, measles cases were as high as 500, 000 with 500 deaths every year.

Public health workers need to be competent enough to deal with measles cases. They need to be competent in measles vaccination. Public health workers should be well trained to be able to deal with emergencies and endemic diseases. They should be able to act with speed and professionalism in maintaining the situation, but most importantly, they should emphasize preventive measures such as vaccination (Turncock, 2012). Competency frameworks are important because they offer guidelines on health training, especially as concerns dealing with communicable and chronic diseases.

They provide standards for health practitioners to follow so that they are able to respond to health issues such as disease breakdowns and deal with preventive and curative measures.