The number of children receiving no vaccines at all in the WHO European region fell by 43,000 in 2025, according to a joint report by the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children's Fund, though 566,000 children still lacked any immunisation and a further 258,000 were only partially protected.
More than half of the entirely unvaccinated children live in just four countries — Kazakhstan, Turkey, Britain, and Azerbaijan. In Germany, 21,000 children remain unvaccinated, while 55 percent of German girls are fully vaccinated against HPV, well above the regional average of 41 percent. Coverage for diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis held steady at 94 percent region-wide, but the share of children receiving a first measles dose slipped to 92 percent, down from 94 percent in 2019.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus noted that vaccines have saved more than 150 million lives over the past five decades.