The World Health Organization yesterday voiced alarm at the rapid spread of measles, with more than 306,000 cases reported worldwide last year -- a 79-percent increase from 2022.

"We in the measles world are extremely concerned," said Natasha Crowcroft, a WHO technical adviser on measles and rubella.

She stressed though that measles cases are typically dramatically under-reported, and that the real number was surely far higher.

To get more accurate figures, the UN health agency models the numbers each year, with its latest estimate indicating that there were 9.2 million cases and 136,216 measles deaths in 2022.

Such modelling has not yet been done for last year, but Crowcroft pointed out that 2022 had already seen a 43-percent jump in deaths from the year before.