Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what steps her Department has taken to help tackle rubella contracted by children in Africa.

Rubella is a vaccine-preventable disease. The UK is the largest donor to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, which protects children from rubella through the Measles-Rubella vaccine. By the end of 2015, Gavi had immunised 164 million children with measles-rubella vaccine.

From 2016 to 2020 Gavi will greatly scale up the Measles-Rubella vaccine, averting more than 1 million future deaths, and greatly reducing the number of children in Africa who suffer from Congenital Rubella Syndrome each year. In total, the UK will invest £1.44bn in Gavi between 2016 and 2020, to immunise 76 million children and save 1.4 million lives.

The Department for International Development supports countries to strengthen their health care systems so that they can provide good quality services to prevent and treat all the main illnesses affecting children, including Congenital Rubella Syndrome.