Vaccination rates for the MMR jab have stalled in England, well below the required coverage to prevent a measles epidemic, the latest figures show.

Children in many areas are still not receiving the recommended two doses of the jab — for measles, mumps and rubella — with less than half of five-year-olds in London having received both a vaccine and booster.

The Government has launched a £5.5 million drive to increase uptake rates after increased rates of measles were reported in recent months.

The new data from the NHS Information Centre shows that 85 per cent of children had had the triple jab by aged two in 2007-8 - the same as the year before.

But to achieve the “herd immunity” needed to virtually eradicate illness, 95 per cent of children need to be vaccinated.

The vaccination rate has been well below the required level for several years since the Lancet medical journal published a research paper in 1998, purporting to show a link between MMR and the risk of bowel disorders and autism.

The study has since been discredited, but coverage of the vaccine plummeted in the wake of the controvesy from 91 per cent in 1997 to 80 per cent in 2003.

Confidence in the combined vaccine has since been slow to recover. Nonetheless, uptake had been rising since 2003-4 until the latest figures were published.

It comes after rates of measles rose this year to reach 797 cases by the end of July, with two thirds of the cases reported in London, the Health Protection Agency said. The total for the whole of 2007 was 990 cases.

Nearly three-quarters of all laboratory confirmed cases so far this year were in children aged one to 18 years — only 4.5 per cent of these were reported as having receiving at least one dose of a measles vaccine.

The Chief Medical Officer pledged extra funding for local NHS Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) to undertake catch-up programmes to immunise children and young people up to the age of 18 years who have not received a full course of vaccination.

Without an improvement in coverage, a measles epidemic would happen “at some point”, he added.

However, just 24 out of the 152 PCTs recorded uptake rates of over 90 per cent and none achieved the 95 per cent mark in the last year.

London had the worst record with the overall average for the capital below 80 per cent — although not all trusts could provide complete data.

By age five, 74 per cent had had the recommended booster dose, offered to protect the one in 10 children who fail to develop immunity after a first dose.

But officials said the overall vaccination rate could be higher as some parents may be organising separate single vaccinations instead of the three-in-one combined jab.

Professor David Salisbury, the government’s director of immunisation, said: “MMR uptake is still not sufficient to remove the serious threat of measles outbreaks.

“Parents who have not had their children vaccinated with the MMR vaccine should do so now.

“The evidence on MMR is absolutely clear — there is no link between the vaccine and autism and delaying immunisation puts children at risk.”

James Cleverly AM, Chairman of the London Assembly Health and Public Services Committee, called for “immediate action to protect Londoners from disease before the risks to public health increase even further.”

“The gap between coverage levels achieved in the capital and the national average is widening. This is unacceptable. Complications from measles and mumps can be devastating to children and their families. Parents need to give their children a healthy start in life — vaccinations are an effective means of preventing potentially life-threatening diseases."

“It is worrying that 11 London PCTs did not report any data, as without knowing the true scale of the problem, we cannot begin to tackle this danger to public health.”

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