How the measles made its way back to Canada and threatened our victory over the virus

By Nathan VanderKlippe The Globe and Mail Published September 20, 2025

No one saw much cause for alarm when the Pattanasat Witaya School in the deep south of Thailand first noticed last summer that children were getting sick, their chests flushing with bumpy red spots.

“It started small,” recalled Mustafa Durrah, the director of the school, a private institution that offers Islamic instruction in a part of the country where mosques are more common than temples. A handful of students became ill, displaying a tell-tale rash that most in this part of the world can still easily identify.

Mustafa Durrah, the director of Pattanasat Witaya School in southern Thailand. LAUREN DECICCA/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

It was the measles, that pestilence that has defied one of humanity’s most intense