Project Releases New Timeline on RFK’s Incompetent and Dangerous Response to Outbreaks of Preventable Diseases
Washington D.C. – Today, the Washington Post reports that a measles outbreak in South Carolina is “accelerating”, and that “[o]f the 111 measles cases recorded in that area, known as the Upstate region, 105 involved people who were unvaccinated.”
The national inoculation rate for the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine has dropped in recent years, particularly since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic and an uptick of vaccine misinformation that at times has propagated on social media and among some public officials, including President Donald Trump and his pick for health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Even a small decline in vaccination can significantly increase the likelihood of an outbreak. Measles can “easily cross borders” into any community where vaccination rates are below 95 percent, according to the CDC.
It is unclear whether HHS Secretary Kennedy still believes — as he did in April during an outbreak in Texas that left two children dead – that “measles deserves less attention than other chronic diseases.”
“It is perverse that Trump’s health secretary has fanned the flames of skepticism around the long-proven safe and effective MMR vaccine, including falsely claiming it has not been “safety tested,” said Kayla Hancock, Director of Public Health Watch, a project of Protect Our Care. “President Trump and Secretary Kennedy have personally contributed to rising fear and misinformation about vaccines that almost certainly led to decisions not to inoculate children, which not only jeopardizes the health of the unvaccinated, but also communities at large. The consequences of Kennedy’s flippant, conspiracy-driven approach to protecting America’s health are coming home to roost. The measles outbreak in South Carolina that follows a tragic one in Texas is a larger symptom of the reckless and irresponsible Trump-RFK Jr. anti-vax fear campaign that has no grounding in reality and has been widely condemned by medical and scientific communities.”
A TIMELINE OF SEC. KENNEDY’S INCOMPETENT RESPONSE TO RISE IN MEASLES INFECTIONS:
FEBRUARY 2025
A child died of measles in Texas shortly after RFK Jr.’s confirmation. This death was the first measles death in the US in a decade. Kennedy dismisses the deadly Texas measles outbreak as “not unusual” but later backtracks and says that ending it is HHS’s “top priority” even as the agency continues to downplay vaccination.
NBC: First measles death reported in Texas as Kennedy downplays the outbreak “Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Wednesday appeared to downplay the seriousness of the West Texas measles outbreak that has killed a school-age child. The child’s death, the first from the disease in a decade in the United States, was confirmed by Katherine Wells, director of public health at the health department in Lubbock, Texas. The child had not been vaccinated against the measles. The outbreak has so far infected at least 124 people — mostly children — in rural West Texas.”
CNN: RFK Jr. said measles outbreaks are ‘not unusual’ in the US. Doctors say he’s wrong When Health and Human Services Sec. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kennedy answered questions during the first cabinet meeting of the new Trump administration, he incorrectly described the number of people who died in a West Texas measles outbreak and the reason people were hospitalized. Measles outbreaks are “not unusual,” Kennedy said. Doctors say that was wrong, too.
MARCH 2025
Three months into 2025, the total number of measles cases in the United States had already surpassed the total for all of 2024. The Texas outbreak continues to spread, and an unvaccinated adult dies of measles-related causes in New Mexico. Kennedy supports Vitamin A as a treatment for measles, leaving some children in Texas more ill after taking it. Kennedy also claims that the measles outbreak was caused by poor diet and health. The top spokesman at HHS quits because of his growing discomfort with Kennedy’s response to the measles outbreak.
CNN: Three months into 2025, US measles cases surpass total for 2024 Three months into 2025, the United States has surpassed the total number of measles cases in the country for all of last year.
New York Times: As Measles Spreads, Kennedy Embraces Remedies Like Cod Liver Oil As a measles outbreak expands in West Texas, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health and human services secretary, on Tuesday cheered several unconventional treatments, including cod liver oil, but again did not urge Americans to get vaccinated. In a prerecorded interview that aired on Fox News, Mr. Kennedy said that the federal government was shipping doses of vitamin A to Gaines County, the epicenter of the outbreak, and helping to arrange ambulance rides. H.H.S. officials previously said they were shipping doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine to Texas, but Mr. Kennedy did not discuss vaccination. Texas doctors had seen “very, very good results,” Mr. Kennedy claimed, by treating measles cases with a steroid, budesonide; an antibiotic called clarithromycin; and cod liver oil, which he said had high levels of vitamin A and vitamin D. While physicians sometimes administer doses of vitamin A to treat children with severe measles cases, cod liver oil is “by no means” an evidence-based treatment, said Dr. Sean O’Leary, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases.
New York Times: Without Offering Proof, Kennedy Links Measles Outbreak to Poor Diet and Health In a sweeping interview, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health and human services secretary, outlined a strategy for containing the measles outbreak in West Texas that strayed far from mainstream science, relying heavily on fringe theories about prevention and treatments. He issued a muffled call for vaccinations in the affected community, but said the choice was a personal one. He suggested that measles vaccine injuries were more common than known, contrary to extensive research. He asserted that natural immunity to measles, gained through infection, somehow also protected against cancer and heart disease, a claim not supported by research. He cheered on questionable treatments like cod liver oil, and said that local doctors had achieved “almost miraculous and instantaneous” recoveries with steroids or antibiotics. The worsening measles outbreak, which has largely spread through a Mennonite community in Gaines County, has infected nearly 200 people and killed a child, the first such death in the United States in 10 years. Another suspected measles death has been reported in New Mexico, where cases have recently increased in a county that borders Gaines County.
CNN: Some measles patients in West Texas show signs of vitamin A toxicity, doctors say, raising concerns about misinformation Doctors treating people hospitalized as part of a measles outbreak in Texas and New Mexico have also found themselves facing another problem: vitamin A toxicity. At Covenant Children’s Hospital in Lubbock, near the outbreak’s epicenter, several patients have been found to have abnormal liver function on routine lab tests, a probable sign that they’ve taken too much of the vitamin, according to Dr. Lara Johnson, pediatric hospitalist and chief medical officer for Covenant Health-Lubbock Service Area. The hospitalized children with the toxicity were all unvaccinated.
Politico: Top HHS spokesperson quits after clashing with RFK Jr. The top spokesperson at the Health and Human Services Department has abruptly quit after clashing with Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his close aides over their management of the agency amid a growing measles outbreak, two people familiar with the matter told POLITICO. Thomas Corry announced on Monday that he had resigned “effective immediately,” just two weeks after joining the department as its assistant secretary for public affairs. “I want to announce to my friends and colleagues that last Friday I announced my resignation effective immediately,” he wrote in a post to his LinkedIn page. “To my colleagues at HHS, I wish you the best and great success.” The sudden departure was prompted by growing disagreement with Kennedy and his principal deputy chief of staff, Stefanie Spear, over their management of the health department, said the two people, who were granted anonymity to speak candidly. Corry had also grown uneasy with Kennedy’s muted response to the intensifying outbreak of measles in Texas, the people said. The outbreak has infected at least 146 people and resulted in the nation’s first death from the disease in a decade.
APRIL 2025
A second child dies of measles in Texas as the outbreak rages. Kennedy continues to promote quack treatments for measles. Under pressure, Kennedy finally concedes that vaccination is the best way to prevent the measles, but reverses himself days later, continuing to downplay the outbreak and question vaccine safety. Federal funding cuts threaten the response to the measles outbreak.
NBC: Second measles death reported in Texas Another child with measles in Texas has died, the Department of Health and Human Services confirmed late Saturday night, though the exact cause of death is under investigation. This would be the second pediatric death amid a fast-growing outbreak that’s infected nearly 500 people in Texas alone since January. An adult in New Mexico is also suspected of dying from measles. The deaths are the first from the disease in the United States in a decade. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was expected to attend the child’s funeral, which is scheduled for Sunday, according to a person familiar with the plans.
- The Guardian: RFK Jr stayed silent on vaccine, says father of child who died from measles A Texas man who buried his eight-year-old daughter on Sunday after the unvaccinated child died with measles says Robert F Kennedy Jr “never said anything” about the vaccine against the illness or its proven efficacy while visiting the girl’s family and community for her funeral. “He did not say that the vaccine was effective,” Pete Hildebrand, the father of Daisy Hildebrand, said in reference to Kennedy during a brief interview on Monday. “I had supper with the guy … and he never said anything about that.”
Washington Post: Millions of U.S. measles cases forecast over 25 years if shots decline The United States faces millions of measles cases over the next 25 years if vaccination rates for the disease drop 10 percent, according to new research published Thursday. No change in the current vaccination rate would result in hundreds of thousands of measles cases over the same period, according to a mathematical model produced by a team of Stanford University researchers. “Our country is on a tipping point for measles to once again become a common household disease,” said Nathan Lo, a Stanford physician and author of the study published in the medical journal JAMA.
- Stat: U.S. may be reverting to a time when measles deaths were not very rare, experts warn The United States recorded three measles deaths in the first 24 years of this century. In just over three months of 2025, it has equaled that number.
- New York Times: Measles Surge in Southwest Is Now the Largest Single Outbreak Since 2000 The spread of measles in the Southwest now constitutes the largest single outbreak since the United States declared the disease eliminated in 2000, federal scientists told state officials in a meeting on Monday.
The Daily Beast: RFK Jr. Touts Bogus Measles Treatment Hours After Burying 8-Year-Old Child Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. touted the work of two controversial “healers” Sunday—just hours after advocating for vaccinations and attending the funeral of a child who died as part of a measles outbreak taking over Texas. Kennedy praised Dr. Richard Bartlett, who, according to CNN, has a history of using unconventional treatments and who was disciplined for “unusual use of risk-filled medications” by the Texas Medical Board in 2003. While none of the patients at the time had measles, the Texas Medical Board found that Bartlett had misdiagnosed his patients and mismanaged their care. He was cleared to return to practice in 2005. Kennedy then touted the work of Dr. Ben Edwards, who, according to The New York Times, is a vocal antivaxxer and who has a “wellness clinic” that dishes out vitamin C supplements and cod liver oil, both as a lemon-flavored drink and unflavored soft gels. In his latest X post, Kennedy was flanked by two families affected by the measles outbreak.
NBC: Kennedy draws from misinformation playbook by touting an inhaled steroid to treat measles The measles outbreak in West Texas has reignited familiar anti-vaccine tactics: claiming there are readily available treatments for the disease while sowing doubt in the safety of vaccines. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Sunday touted two particular medications that have not been shown to work as first-line treatments for measles: the steroid budesonide and the antibiotic clarithromycin. Although experts say there are no specific treatments proven to help people recover faster from measles, Kennedy claimed on X that the medications had been instrumental in treating around 300 children in Texas, and told Fox News that doctors prescribing them had seen “very, very good results.” Kennedy has been sharply criticized by medical experts for weeks for spreading misinformation about the measles vaccine and failing to encourage parents to vaccinate their children.
USA Today: RFK Jr. claims ‘leaky’ measles vaccine wanes over time. Scientists say he’s wrong. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the measles vaccine is “leaky” because its effectiveness wanes over time, something medical experts dispute. Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic who now oversees the nation’s federal health agencies, said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is doing a “very good job” of controlling the measles outbreak that has infected more than 700 Americans in 25 states as of April 10. But Kennedy suggested the vaccine effectiveness wanes at a rate of nearly 5% a year – an assertion not backed by scientists
APRIL 6: Stat: ‘Most effective way’ to prevent measles is vaccination, RFK Jr. says, in most direct remarks yet Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Sunday that “the most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine,” his most direct statement yet on the issue, following the death of a second child of the condition in the outbreak in West Texas. Kennedy, who has long described the vaccine as dangerous, has largely avoided endorsing its use since the start of the outbreak, and he stopped short of explicitly saying he “recommended” it in his latest remarks, as public health officials have called on him to do.
APRIL 10: Stat: RFK Jr. suggests some vaccines are risky or ineffective, downplays measles threat Facing a growing outbreak of measles that could test his leadership, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. this week is sowing doubt about the safety and efficacy of some vaccines — beyond the measles shot — and arguing the government shouldn’t mandate their use. He also raised questions about what killed an 8-year-old girl whose death was attributed to measles by health officials, his latest remarks that downplay the threat of the virus. In an interview with CBS News that aired Wednesday, the nation’s top health official said that “people should get the measles vaccine,” a more direct assertion than has been typical from Kennedy, who has a long history of questioning vaccine safety. At the same time, however, he appeared to minimize the threat of a growing outbreak centered in Texas and New Mexico and sent mixed signals about vaccines, saying many vaccines “aren’t safety tested.” He went on to argue they’re not tested against placebo groups or only over short periods of time. Public health officials across independent bodies have repeatedly approved vaccines based on their safety and efficacy evidence, including placebo-controlled trials and long-term studies. “When I say they’re not safety tested, what I mean is that they’re not adequately [tested],” he said.
MAY 2025
Kennedy announces that HHS will research new treatments and cures for measles instead of focusing on vaccination. He also urges parents to “do their own research” on measles vaccines and promotes the unfounded claim that the MMR vaccine includes “aborted fetus debris.” The Texas measles outbreak continues to grow.
Politico: Measles hits 1,000 cases — for the second time in 30 years The measles outbreak has surpassed 1,000 cases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed Friday, a grim milestone that has only been achieved twice in the last 30 years. Three people have died in the outbreak, according to the CDC, including two school-aged children in Texas. Children under 5 account for roughly one-third of the 1,001 cases, the majority of which have been recorded in Texas. Nearly all patients — 96 percent — were unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status.
New York Times: Kennedy Orders Search for New Measles Treatments Instead of Urging Vaccination With the United States facing its largest single measles outbreak in 25 years, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will direct federal health agencies to explore potential new treatments for the disease, including vitamins, according to an H.H.S. spokesman. The decision is the latest in a series of actions by the nation’s top health official that experts fear will undermine public confidence in vaccines as an essential public health tool. The announcement comes as Mr. Kennedy faces intense backlash for his handling of the outbreak. It has swept through large areas of the Southwest where vaccination rates are low, infecting hundreds and killing two young girls. On Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported more than 930 cases nationwide, most of which are associated with the Southwest outbreak. Critics have said Mr. Kennedy has focused too much on untested treatments — such as cod liver oil supplements — and offered only muted support for the measles vaccine, which studies show is 97 percent effective in preventing infection. The decision to put more resources into potential treatments, rather than urging vaccination, could have grave consequences at the center of the outbreak. “We don’t want to send the signal that you don’t have to get vaccinated because there’s just a way to get rid of it,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at the Brown University School of Public Health.
New York Times: Kennedy Advises New Parents to ‘Do Your Own Research’ on Vaccines Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. advised parents of newborns to “do your own research” before vaccinating their infants during a televised interview in which he also suggested the measles shot was unsafe and repeatedly made false statements that cast doubt on the benefits of vaccination and the independence of the Food and Drug Administration. Mr. Kennedy made the remarks to the talk show host Dr. Phil in an interview that aired Monday on MeritTV to mark the 100th day of the Trump administration. He said, as he has in the past, that “if you want to avoid spreading measles, the best thing you can do is take that vaccine.” But Mr. Kennedy also made clear, as he has in the past, that he believes it is up to individuals to decide. In suggesting vaccines are unsafe, he contradicted decades of advice from public health experts, including leaders of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “I would say that we live in a democracy, and part of the responsibility of being a parent is to do your own research,” the health secretary said, in response to a question from a woman in the audience who asked how he would advise a new parent about vaccine safety. “You research the baby stroller, you research the foods that they’re getting, and you need to research the medicines that they’re taking as well.”
The Guardian: RFK Jr and health agency falsely claim MMR vaccine includes ‘aborted fetus debris’ Health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr and his department have made a series of misleading statements that alarmed vaccine experts and advocates in recent days – including that the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine includes “aborted fetus debris”. Health department officials released statements saying they could alter vaccine testing and build new “surveillance systems” on Wednesday, both of which have unnerved experts who view new placebo testing as potentially unethical. “It’s his goal to even further lessen trust in vaccines and make it onerous enough for manufacturers that they will abandon it,” said Dr Paul Offit, an expert on infectious disease and immunology and the director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, about the statements and Kennedy. “It’s a fragile market.”
CBS: Weekly Measles Cases Hit New Record Amid Worst Outbreak Since 1990s Weekly measles cases have set a new record, according to figures published Friday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, topping the peak of an outbreak in 2019 that ranked as the worst since the 1990s. The number of cases that had their symptoms start during the week of March 30 has grown to 111, according to the agency’s latest update. Authorities backdate newly reported measles cases based on when their rash began, to account for delays in reporting and diagnosis. That tops the 102 cases reported for the week of March 23, 2019, at the height of that year’s wave. By the end of 2019, measles cases that year added up to the largest annual tally since endemic spread of the virus was declared eliminated in 2000.
JUNE 2025
Time: Measles Vaccination Rates Are Plummeting Across the U.S. Childhood vaccination rates against measles, mumps, and rubella have been declining in much of the U.S. since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, a new study has found. The study, which was published in JAMA on June 2, analyzed measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination rates by county where data were available. Researchers at Johns Hopkins University collected county-level data on MMR vaccination rates for kindergarteners from each state’s health department website for the school years before the pandemic (2017-2018) and after (2023-2024). In states where that data were not available, researchers analyzed the most comparable data instead.
Associated Press: Amid measles outbreak, Texas is poised to make vaccine exemptions for kids easier Texas this year has been the center of the nation’s largest measles outbreak in more than two decades, as a mostly eradicated disease has sickened more than 700 in the state, sent dozens to hospitals and led to the death of two children who were unvaccinated. But even as the outbreak slows, a bill approved by state lawmakers and sent to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott would make it significantly easier for parents to enroll their children in school without standard vaccinations for diseases such as measles, whooping cough, polio and hepatitis A and B.
JULY 2025
Washington Post: U.S. Measles Cases Reach 33-Year High as Outbreaks Spread. The United States has reached its highest annual measles case tally in 33 years, hitting at least 1,277 confirmed cases across 38 states and the District of Columbia. The milestone marks a public health reversal in defeating a highly contagious, vaccine-preventable disease as the anti-vaccine movement gains strength. … Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime anti-vaccine activist who ascended to be the top U.S. health official, has offered mixed messages about measles and the vaccine to prevent it. He initially downplayed the seriousness of the Texas outbreak after the first child died, saying: “We have measles outbreaks every year.” He accompanied his calls for vaccination with caveats, raising concerns about the shots that public health experts called unfounded.
AUGUST 2025
Texas declares its measles outbreak over after thousands of cases and two child deaths. KFF reports that Texas officials looked to the CDC for help during the outbreak, but nobody responded.
Associated Press: Texas declares its measles outbreak over The Texas measles outbreak that sickened 762 people since late January is over, state health officials said Monday. Health officials have not confirmed a new case in the counties where the outbreak was spreading in more than 42 days, passing the threshold public health officials use to declare measles outbreaks over. The last outbreak-related case in Texas was on July 1, according to state data. Two young Texas children died of the virus earlier this year and 100 people were hospitalized throughout the outbreak. The cases were linked to outbreaks in Canada and Mexico and jumped to other states in the U.S.
Associated Press: U.S. childhood vaccination rates fall again as exemptions set another record U.S. kindergarten vaccination rates inched down again last year and the share of children with exemptions rose to an all-time high, according to federal data posted Thursday.
KFF Health News: As Measles Exploded, Officials in Texas Looked to CDC Scientists. Under Trump, No One Answered. As measles surged in Texas early this year, the Trump administration’s actions sowed fear and confusion among CDC scientists that kept them from performing the agency’s most critical function — emergency response — when it mattered most, an investigation from KFF Health News shows. The outbreak soon became the worst the United States has endured in over three decades. In the month after Donald Trump took office, his administration interfered with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention communications, stalled the agency’s reports, censored its data, and abruptly laid off staff. In the chaos, CDC experts felt restrained from talking openly with local public health workers, according to interviews with seven CDC officials with direct knowledge of events, as well as local health department emails obtained by KFF Health News through public records requests. “CDC hasn’t reached out to us locally,” Katherine Wells, the public health director in Lubbock, Texas, wrote in a Feb. 5 email exchange with a colleague two weeks after children with measles were hospitalized in Lubbock. “My staff feels like we are out here all alone,” she added. A child would die before CDC scientists contacted Wells.
SEPTEMBER 2025
RFK Jr. claims the HHS response to the measles outbreak in Texas was a success as a new outbreak grows in Utah and Arizona, and a California child dies from complications of a measles infection contracted in infancy.
The Hill: RFK Jr. touts measles response in defense of CDC overhaul The largest single measles outbreak the country has endured in more than 30 years is being hailed as a success story by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In a Wall Street Journal opinion article published Tuesday defending his overhaul of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Kennedy said the administration’s response to the outbreak that began in West Texas is a testament to what a “focused CDC can achieve.” “The outbreak ended quickly, proving the CDC can act swiftly with precision when guided by science and freed from ideology,” Kennedy wrote, adding the response was “effective” because it wasn’t “distracted” by politically correct language or “equity outcomes.” Local officials declared the outbreak officially over on Aug. 18. The outbreak hospitalized nearly 100 people in West Texas and killed two children. Infections linked to Texas spread across the Southwest to New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and Mexico’s Chihuahua state.
USA Today: US measles cases surpass 1,500 as outbreaks grow in parts of Utah and Arizona Measles infections in the United States have reached a new high since the disease was declared eradicated in 2000, surpassing 1,500 cases on Sept. 24 with outbreaks growing in parts of Utah and Arizona, public health officials said. A total of 1,514 measles cases have been confirmed in the United States as of Sept. 24, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Though the majority of cases are linked to a large outbreak that originated in West Texas, other outbreaks and cases have arisen from community transmission or during travel in other states. In recent months, cases in parts of Utah and Arizona have steadily increased. As of Sept. 24, the Utah Department of Health and Human Services confirmed 42 cases, with most infections concentrated in southwest Utah near the Arizona state line.
Los Angeles Times: L.A. child dies from complication of measles infection contracted in infancy A school-age child in Los Angeles County has died from a rare complication of measles after contracting the disease in infancy, the county public health department announced Thursday. The child — who was not old enough to be vaccinated at the time of infection — died from subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, a fatal progressive brain disorder that strikes roughly 1 in 10,000 people infected with measles in the U.S. Doctors believe the risk is as high as 1 in every 600 children who contract measles as a baby. The disorder typically develops two to 10 years after initial infection, even when — as in this child’s case — the patient recovers fully from measles. The disease begins with seizures, cognitive decline and involuntary muscle spasms, and progresses to dementia, coma and eventually death. “Most pediatricians in the U.S. have never seen a child with SSPE because we’ve been vaccinating kids against measles for decades,” said Dr. Adam Ratner, a New York-based pediatric infectious-disease specialist and author of the book, “Booster Shots: The Urgent Lessons of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children’s Health.”
OCTOBER 2025
New measles outbreaks spread in Utah, Arizona and South Carolina. CDC continues to question the safety of combined measles vaccines.
NBC: Measles spreading beyond the center of the Utah-Arizona outbreak The nation’s second-largest measles outbreak this year is spreading beyond its epicenter along the Utah-Arizona border. Most of the known measles cases — 123 as of Wednesday — are linked to a tight-knit community of twin towns: Colorado City, in Mohave County, Arizona, and Hildale, which is in Washington County, Utah. Within the past few weeks, there have been three cases in nearby, larger towns, such as Hurricane and St. George, Utah. Those exposures occurred in hospital and urgent care settings, according to the Southwest Utah Public Health Department. There is no discernible border; residents live, work and worship interchangeably between the two towns. Many of the clusters started in schools, said David Heaton, public information officer for the health department. “But now we have community spread,” he said. Measles has also reached Iron County, just north of the current outbreak. The new areas are popular tourist destinations in southwest Utah, which is also home to Zion National Park. All three affected counties have vaccination rates far lower than the 95% experts say is needed for herd immunity.
NBC: Hundreds of U.S. students quarantined amid measles outbreaks A bubbling measles outbreak in the upstate of South Carolina has forced 153 unvaccinated children out of the classroom and into quarantine for a minimum of 21 days. In Minnesota, where a small outbreak has been growing for the last month, 118 students are also under quarantine in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area after being exposed to the highly contagious virus, health officials said Friday. The restrictions mean three weeks of remote learning as parents monitor for fever, rash and other symptoms. “Communities are having to bear the price of quarantining so many children,” said Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert and the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. “Expect more of the same. This is going to happen more and more frequently.”
Wall Street Journal: RFK Jr.-Backed Panel Advises Against MMRV Combo Vaccine for Young Children Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s handpicked slate of vaccine advisers voted to no longer recommend a combined shot for measles, mumps, rubella and varicella for children under age 4. The move came as some states, insurers, public health leaders and a U.S. senator called into question whether Americans should rely on the committee’s decisions.
NBC: Acting CDC director calls to ‘break up’ the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine into three shots Acting CDC Director Jim O’Neill on Monday called on vaccine manufacturers to develop separate shots for measles, mumps and rubella instead of the current vaccine, which combines the three. O’Neill wrote in a post on X that manufacturers should replace the MMR vaccine with “safe monovalent vaccines,” which only target one virus. His statement referenced a recent comment from President Donald Trump, who advised people last month on Truth Social to “break up the MMR shot into three totally separate shots.” However, no monovalent vaccines for measles, mumps or rubella are approved in the U.S., and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says there is no published scientific evidence that shows a benefit to separating the combined vaccine. It is not clear whether the change O’Neill is calling for is possible or likely to come about.
NOVEMBER 2025
Canada officially loses its measles elimination status, with the US projected to follow.
New York Times: C.D.C. Links Measles Outbreaks in Multiple States for the First Time The measles strain that triggered a huge outbreak in the Southwest continues to spread, threatening to end America’s status as a nation that by and large has eliminated the illness, a federal health official said on Monday. The news came in a conference call, a recording of which was obtained by The New York Times, among officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health departments. The chain of transmission began in January, in a conservative Mennonite group on the western edge of Texas, and spread to Oklahoma and New Mexico. Countries lose their so-called elimination status, as determined by the World Health Organization, after 12 months of sustained transmission. The United States, which has held elimination status for 25 years, will reach that critical deadline at the end of January 2026.
The Hill: Canada loses its measles elimination status, and the US is close behind. Canada has lost its measles elimination status nearly three decades after it achieved the distinction, under circumstances that closely resemble what’s happened in the U.S. this year. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) notified the Public Health Agency of Canada last week that the country no longer holds a measles elimination status, meaning the region of the Americas at large has lost this categorization. […] According to the PAHO, if measles transmission isn’t halted by Jan. 20, 2026, the U.S. will also lose its measles elimination status. Mexico could follow soon after, having seen sustained transmission since Feb. 1, 2025.
DECEMBER 2025
NBC: South Carolina measles outbreak is ‘accelerating,’ driving hundreds into quarantine The measles outbreak in South Carolina is “accelerating” with no end in sight following Thanksgiving and other large gatherings, state health officials said Wednesday. As of Wednesday, 111 measles cases had been reported in what’s known as upstate South Carolina — an area in the northwest of the state that includes Greenville and Spartanburg. “We are faced with ongoing transmission that we anticipate will go on for many more weeks,” Dr. Linda Bell, state epidemiologist for the South Carolina Department of Public Health, said during a news briefing Wednesday.
###