Washington D.C. – While the Trump-RFK Jr. HHS continues to push a dangerous and evidence-free anti-vax agenda, the United States is now poised to lose its measles elimination status as today marks 12 straight months of measles transmission. Measles infections are now reported in at least 9 states, most severely in South Carolina where confirmed cases now top 640 – almost exclusively among unvaccinated children. The latest preventable infections follow the 2,144 measles cases reported in 2025 (including 3 deaths) — the highest number in over three decades – while “the majority, 93%, were either unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccine status.” And yet, Trump Health Secretary RFK Jr. has expressed no sense of urgency over the spiraling situation, or regret for spreading gross misinformation about the measles vaccine itself on national television last year.
In hopes of convincing the Trump administration to lift a finger to address this public health crisis that could and should have been avoided, today public health experts including Hawaii Governor Josh Green, M.D., Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, former director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, and Dr. Annie Andrews joined a press conference hosted by Public Health Watch – a project of Protect Our Care – to demand that RFK Jr. take immediate and serious steps to address the rapidly escalating spread of measles among the unvaccinated, before any more children get needlessly sick.
KEY EXCERPTS FROM TODAY’S MEDIA EVENT:
Governor Josh Green, MD (D-HI): “What’s happening today with measles is absolutely public health malpractice, and it’s completely preventable. In this first year of the President’s second term, they’ve kind of taken the gloves off and allowed Secretary Kennedy to just run roughshod over policy. And so what’s happened is that they laid the foundation for distrust of vaccinations over the course of this year. Frankly, the campaign that Kennedy was running, this is not personal for me – it is just medical, because they laid that foundation of distrust. Now you’re seeing the terrible outcomes. And now you’re seeing outbreaks manifest, for example, in South Carolina — over 500 cases and growing. And believe me, there are many, many more cases that don’t ever get disclosed. Because I know, as a family physician, that not everyone comes in to see the doctor or calls or tells their health care provider what’s going on, because they feel a sense of shame or responsibility that they didn’t take care of their kid. It is public health malpractice to have thwarted confidence in vaccinations. And let me be clear, this is not a mild illness. Measles is a serious disease. It can cause pneumonia, it can cause Encephalitis or brain inflammation, and it can cause permanent disability and death. It’s absolutely deadly serious, and it’s completely preventable. But the worst part of it is, it’s being encouraged by our public health leaders. It’s exactly the wrong thing to do. It’s scary. Kids will die. Let’s be clear, kids will die. There’s other consequences too. It’s a problem when federal leaders are undermining confidence in vaccines, not just measles. When you set the stage for people to not have confidence in one vaccine, and then they don’t get the next, the biggest problem is going to occur when we have another epidemic of some sort, when we have bird flu break out in a nasty way, or another terrible variant of some respiratory virus. Now that we’re not doing research and we’re not encouraging people to get vaccinated, the covid pandemic is going to look like a walk in the park if we don’t have the capacity to suppress a virus. So we have to rise up and put an end to this nonsense. And honestly, RFK Jr should leave this position and go work in some other capacity for the President. It is an unforgivable sin that RFK Jr. is committing against the people of America and it’s deeply distressing, and it has to be addressed.”
Demetre C. Daskalakis, MD, MPH, former director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases: “The measles resurgence is not random, it’s fueled by misinformation and disinformation campaigns that undermine the trusted vaccines, discourage immunization and spread myths about vaccine safety. Secretary Kennedy has been a prominent figure in these campaigns. He has used his platform inappropriately public health malpractice to question the safety and efficacy of vaccines, including the MMR. His statements and actions have reached wide audiences, amplifying skepticism and fueling resistance, particularly in the most vulnerable communities. Outbreaks disproportionately affect communities with lower vaccination rates. If we have more measles, we will have more deaths. So measles elimination status is more than a technical metric. It’s a vital sign for our public health system. It reflects our ability to maintain high vaccination coverage, conduct effective surveillance and respond swiftly to outbreaks, the drop in vaccination rates since the pandemic, from 50% of counties with 95% coverage of MMR to just 28% signals, a system in distress that is only made worse by the Secretary when people like him spread doubt about vaccines, the consequences are widespread, weakened population immunity, increasing transmission and the very real possibility of losing our elimination status. This loss would not just be symbolic. It would indicate that our public health infrastructure is failing to protect Americans from preventable disease. If we lose measles elimination status, it will be a clear indicator that our public health infrastructure needs urgent revitalization, and that we must commit to science driven policies rather than the ideological policies that we have seen in the last year. We must confront misinformation head on, engage communities with empathy, empathy and facts and restore the credibility of vaccines as routine life saving tools. Only by doing so, can we protect our children, maintain our elimination status and ensure the health of future generations.”
Dr. Annie Andrews, pediatrician from South Carolina: “We have an incredibly safe and effective vaccine for the measles. One of the reasons we developed a vaccine for measles is because of how contagious this virus is. We think about the flu being contagious. We think about Covid being contagious. The Measles is far more contagious than either one of those other viral diseases. Someone with measles walks into a room, coughs, leaves that room, the measles virus is alive and well in that room for several hours. So the thing about the outbreak happening in South Carolina is the cat is already out of the bag, and now we have to do damage control. I am not at all surprised that South Carolina is the hot bed of this preventable infectious disease outbreak because the majority party in my state has been peddling in disinformation for many, many years. Maybe it is time to listen to our public health professionals who have been banging on their door with science and evidence-based medicine for a long time.”
Kayla Hancock, Director, Public Health Watch, a project of Protect Our Care: “A rise in the proliferation of dangerous anti-vaccine sentiment and misinformation has scared a significant number of American parents out of vaccinating their children. And the person most responsible for this regressive trend is Secretary Kennedy. Over and over, RFK Jr. has used his platform to raise alarm about vaccines that have long been proven safe and effective. On national TV last year, Kennedy recklessly smeared the measles vaccine on several fronts, including a completely fabricated claim that it leads to “deaths every year”. The tragic consequences of the Trump-Kennedy anti-vax agenda are now, unfortunately, coming home to roost. We have yet to hear any public statement from Kennedy or his HHS on the crisis. Instead of using the Trump administration’s vast resources to raise public awareness about getting vaccinated against measles, Kennedy has been busy promoting whole milk and steak on social media and encouraging mothers not to trust medical experts. Bottom Line: The more anti-vax lies RFK Jr. tells about the safety of the measles vaccine, the more kids are going to get seriously ill or worse.”
###