Research published in 1998 caused widespread panic among parents when it suggested a link between MMR and autism -- a claim rejected by the majority of experts.

Number of Cases Recorded Soars 35-Fold in Two Years

Britain is in the grip of a mumps epidemic, public health experts announced yesterday.

Doctors have reported more than 2,300 cases of the illness in Scotland alone since the beginning of the year.

That is nearly 36 times the number of cases recorded in the first four months of 2003, before the latest outbreak began, and three times higher than the same period last year.

Researchers have warned that no opportunity should be missed to offer the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) jab to those at the highest risk of mumps, such as any patients starting school or university.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, the team reported:

"Most patients are aged between 19 and 23 and there is now the threat of outbreaks among under-immunized children."

Young adults born before 1988, when the MMR jab was introduced, would not have been routinely scheduled to receive the vaccine and have fallen prey to the virus.

The researchers said the highest rate was seen in those born between 1983 and 1986, who were too old to be offered the MMR jab routinely, although some may have received one dose of MMR as part of a catch-up program when they entered school.

A study team from Guy's and St Thomas's NHS Foundation Trust reported in the BMJ that cases in younger children may occur due to the more recent fall in uptake of MMR.

Research published in 1998 caused widespread panic among parents when it suggested a link between MMR and autism -- a claim rejected by the majority of experts.

The researchers said the World Health Organization recommended immunization coverage of 90 percent to prevent outbreaks of mumps.

"But uptake of the MMR vaccine among two-year-olds in the UK fell from around 92 percent in early 1995 to around 80 percent in 2003/04.

"In some areas of London, as few as 60 percent of two-year-olds have received a first dose of MMR. This would account for our recent experience with mumps in younger children, " they said.

The team added that the initial success of the MMR program in controlling mumps had been compromised in recent years by sporadic outbreaks.

They revealed: "Since 2004 the number of reported and confirmed cases of mumps has increased, culminating in the current epidemic.

"This epidemic underlines the importance of ensuring that all children and young adults have received two doses of MMR."

Dr. Mac Armstrong, chief medical officer for Scotland, wrote to GPs last August, urging them to offer the injection to patients aged between 13 and 20 when they visited surgeries for other medical reasons.

However, earlier this year doctors branded the attempt to curb the outbreak as a shambles because national funding was not provided for the vaccination program, and instead GPs had to hold separate negotiations about the bill for the project with each health board.

Spread of the illness has accelerated this year. There have been 2,323 cases of the illness recorded by GPs in Scotland, compared with 727 for the same period in 2004 and 3592 for the whole of last year.

Dr. Claire Cameron, an epidemiologist for Health Protection Scotland, said: "At the beginning of the outbreak it was very much something that we were seeing in the west of the country, Greater Glasgow, Argyll and Clyde and Lanarkshire. Now other areas are involved. More recently there has been an increase in Tayside and Lothian and Grampian."

Dr. Cameron said she believed it would be extremely difficult to vaccinate enough people in the worst affected age group to prevent the virus from spreading.

She added: "Certainly mumps can be unpleasant for people, but it is a relatively mild disease."

The doctor added that, although there were fears that mumps could cause male sterility, such cases were rare.