Even with a successful vaccine and effective treatment, COVID-19 may never go away, history professor Nükhet Varlik says.

Alberta Health Services has issued a warning after a confirmed case of measles in the Edmonton area.

While nearly 40 per cent of those children did not get vaccinated because their parents or guardians declined, an equal number missed vaccinations because they weren't offered by the clinician, according to the study in JAMA Pediatrics.

In the neighbouring independent nation of Samoa, more than 60 people have died, mostly children, from the measles and more than 4,000 were infected since the outbreak started in mid-October, health officials said.

The measles virus has infected almost 4,500 people in the South Pacific nation of just 200,000 since late October. Of those who died, 57 were children under the age of four.

The battle to quell the devastating outbreak has been complicated by a vocal anti-vaccination movement, officials say.

"If the only obstacle between the Liberals offering support for this legislation is there's an obstacle, then I'd certainly be happy to look at having it taken out." 

Samoa is trying to contain a measles outbreak that has killed more than 50 people in just weeks.

Schools and universities have been closed and most public gatherings banned on the island state of just 200,000, located south of the equator and half way between Hawaii and New Zealand.

By the end of the catch-up program, just over 84.5 per cent of kids and teens in the health region had received at least one immunization for the virus.