Childhood vaccine coverage stalled in 2025, leaving 13.5 million unvaccinated
WHO and UNICEF estimates put DTP3 coverage at 85% for a second year running. Yellow fever protection sits at 53% in at-risk countries and HPV at 33% in girls, both far below target.
| Group | Value (%) |
|---|---|
| DTP3 | 85 |
| Measles 1st dose | 84 |
| Hepatitis B (3 doses) | 84 |
| Hib (3 doses) | 78 |
| Yellow fever | 53 |
| HPV (girls) | 33 |
Global childhood vaccination coverage did not improve in 2025. WHO and UNICEF estimate that 13.5 million children received no vaccine at all that year, and that coverage of a third dose of the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine (DTP3) — the standard benchmark for how well a system reaches children — held at 85%, unchanged since 2024 [s1].
Read against the global Immunization Agenda 2030 targets, a flat line is not neutral. WHO frames the 2025 estimates as a plateau that leaves several goals off track, with coverage concentrated away from the lowest-income countries that most need it [s1].
What the benchmark numbers say
About 85% of the world's infants, roughly 110 million children, received three DTP doses in 2025 [s1]. Coverage of the first measles dose was 84% [s1]. Because measles spreads so readily, it acts as an early-warning system for immunity gaps, and the gap is wide: nearly 21 million children missed their routine first measles dose, more than the 19 million who missed it in 2019 [s1].
Other antigens show the same pattern of broad introduction but uneven reach. The Hib vaccine, against a cause of meningitis and pneumonia, had been introduced in 193 countries by the end of 2025, yet three-dose coverage sits at 78% globally and ranges from 94% in WHO's South-East Asia Region to 45% in the Western Pacific [s1]. Three-dose hepatitis B coverage is 84%, but the birth dose given within 24 hours of life reaches only 43% of newborns worldwide — 77% in the Western Pacific against 11% in the African Region [s1].
The two numbers furthest from target
Two figures stand out for how far they fall short. Coverage of the yellow fever vaccine in countries at risk of the disease is 53%, well below the 80% WHO considers necessary to prevent outbreaks [s1].
The first dose of HPV vaccine reached an estimated 33% of girls in 2025 — short of the 90% target set for 2030, though up sharply from 17% in 2019 [s1]. The vaccine was delivered through national programmes in 162 countries in 2025, including new introductions in 15, and 93 countries now use a single-dose schedule [s1]. WHO attributes the slowdown in this year's increase to new introductions and scale-up in several large countries being offset by falling performance in others [s1].
One programme is moving in the other direction. Since 2024, malaria vaccines have been introduced and scaled up across 25 countries in Africa, following an implementation programme in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi that demonstrated a vaccine-attributable 13% reduction in all-cause child mortality among age-eligible children [s1].
The longer arc
The stall looks worse against the trajectory that preceded it. A Global Burden of Disease analysis published in The Lancet in June 2025 found that global coverage for the original Expanded Programme on Immunization vaccines nearly doubled between 1980 and 2023 — then stalled after 2010 in many countries [s2]. That study counted 15.7 million children who received no DTP dose in 2023, more than half of them in eight countries, and judged only one of three headline target vaccines on track for 2030 [s2]. Its modelled scenario for halving the number of zero-dose children by 2030, an Immunization Agenda 2030 goal, required progress that recent years have not delivered [s2].
The two sources use different methods — WHO and UNICEF publish administrative and survey-based country estimates, while the Lancet analysis models long-run trends across 204 countries — but they point the same way [s1][s2]. Coverage has stopped climbing at a level that leaves tens of millions of children reachable only on paper.
What to watch
The financing question sits underneath all of it. The reach of routine immunisation in low-income countries depends heavily on external support, and the 2025 plateau arrives as several of those programmes face uncertain funding [s1]. The measles figure is the one to track first: because it exposes immunity gaps fastest, a continued rise in children missing their first dose is the earliest sign that a plateau is turning into a decline [s1].
Sources
- Immunization coverage (fact sheet) — World Health Organization, 15 July 2026
- Global, regional, and national trends in routine childhood vaccination coverage from 1980 to 2023 with forecasts to 2030 — The Lancet, 24 June 2025
Sources
- Immunization coverage (fact sheet) — World Health Organization , July 15, 2026
- Global, regional, and national trends in routine childhood vaccination coverage from 1980 to 2023 with forecasts to 2030: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2023 — The Lancet , June 24, 2025
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