Measles Outbreak in the US Was Entirely Avoidable

Low vaccination rates contributed to the re-emergence of a disease declared eradicated in the country 25 years ago.

- Lisa Jarvis

A measles outbreak in West Texas and New Mexico has killed one person and sickened more than 130, and public health experts fear it is only the beginning. It is an entirely avoidable health emergency fueled by weaknesses in the US' vaccine forcefield.

It is not hard to imagine this type of emergency becoming much worse, much faster, if Mr. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), further undermines the safety of and access to the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine.

Troubling signs are already emerging that Mr. Kennedy, notorious for his vaccine misinformation, might influence the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) messaging and vaccine recommendations.

Members of Mr. Kennedy's Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) inner circle have dismissed the measles threat. Healthcare entrepreneur Calley Means, who is helping to shape and implement the MAHA agenda, complained on CNN about the focus on the Texas outbreak. "Day after day, it's breathless—it's breathless coverage of five measles cases," he said, suggesting chronic disease is meanwhile being ignored.

There is a reason for that "breathless" media coverage. Measles is both scarily contagious and easily preventable.

"It's more contagious than COVID-19, more contagious than the flu, more contagious than Ebola," says Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

After someone with measles coughs or sneezes—or even breathes—tiny droplets of the virus hang in the air like ghosts for up to two hours, waiting to infect anyone who wanders by.