The rate of pregnant women not immune to rubella, which can cause serious birth defects, has tripled since the government abolished mandatory immunization for junior high school girls in 1995, according to a study released Monday by a medical association.

The Japan Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists study shows 16 percent of girls 19 or under who were in junior high school when the program was abolished due to side effects did not have the rubella antibody. In contrast, only 5 percent of those 20 or over, who were covered by the regime, lacked it.

Twenty-seven percent of girls under 17 lacked the antibody, according to the survey study, which covered 8,204 pregnant Japanese treated at 326 hospitals nationwide last year.

The association called on girls to be vaccinated before reaching childbearing age because rubella can cause birth defects such as heart disease and hearing impairments if expectant mothers contract it in the early stages of pregnancy.

The government made it mandatory for junior high school girls to be vaccinated for rubella and set up the program in 1977 to prevent infection by pregnant women.

But the regime was abolished in 1995 under the revised Preventive Vaccination Law after side effects caused by the vaccine drew public attention.

Under the new law, the government called for efforts to have children between 1 and 7 1/2vaccinated, leaving women born between 1982 and 1987 with a low immunity rate.

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry estimates there are some 6 million men and women who were not vaccinated and is calling for them to be immunized.