Two in three children fail to have MMR jab by age 5

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Health experts warned that ongoing safety concerns about the vaccine are partly to blame for dramatic local variations.

Only about a third of children in three health areas — Brent, the City and Hackney and Haringey — have had the vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella.

Only about half of the children in Camden, Hammersmith & Fulham, Islington and Lewisham, have had the jab. According to official advice the first dose of the inoculation should be given by the age of 13 months and the second before a child is five.

Now-discredited research that linked MMR and autism has led to parents boycotting the treatment.

The best performing areas in London in 2008-9, the most up-to-date figures available, were Barnet, Richmond and Twickenham, Westminster and Newham, where more than 80 per cent had the jab by the time they were five, according to figures revealed in a parliamentary question.

Figures from the NHS Information Centre showed that London-wide the number of children between two and five given both doses of the vaccine rose from 49 per cent last year to 63 per cent. Nationally the figure rose from 74 per cent to 78 per cent.

Richard Halvorsen who runs a vaccine clinic in London said parents were still concerned about the safety of MMR despite the lack of evidence that it causes health problems such as autism.

Dr Halvorsen, medical director of the Babyjabs clinic in Mayfair, said: "In my experience there are two groups of people who are not immunising their children. The first are the socially deprived who have a chaotic lifestyle and don't get around to it. Then there are educated parents who have selected not to get their child immunised."