1,000 Measles Cases in the US, But Few Solutions From RFK Jr.
For only the second time in three decades, the number of measles cases in the United States has surpassed 1,000 in a calendar year, with no sign of new cases slowing down any time soon.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are presently 14 measles outbreaks (defined as three or more cases in a given area) across 30 states in the U.S., amounting to 1,001 confirmed cases as of May 8.
The majority of those cases, 68 percent, are among individuals under the age of 19. Three in 10 cases involve children under the age of 5 years old.
The vast majority of infections, 96 percent, involve people who are not vaccinated against measles or whose vaccination status is unknown. Only 2 percent of infections involve people who had received two doses of an MMR vaccine (which also covers mumps and rubella).
Three people have died from measles since January 1 — the first time anyone has died of the virus in the U.S. since 2015, and the highest number of measles deaths in the U.S. since 1992.
Texas has seen the bulk of cases reported by the CDC, accounting for 709 cases since the start of the year through May 9. Over 90 patients in the state have been hospitalized, or roughly 13 percent of those who have been diagnosed with measles.
Two of the three casualties of the virus have been children in Texas, the Texas Department of State Health Services has acknowledged.
The new cases mark a stark increase from just a few weeks ago, when measles cases totaled less than 900 in total at the end of April.
Measles, which typically manifests in rashes on the skin, can also lead to significant respiratory problems, long-term lung damage and even permanent brain damage.
The increase in cases comes as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), is instead focusing on the so-called “chronic disease epidemic” and has wrongly described the measles outbreak as commonplace, errantly stating that events like these happen “every year,” despite the virus being considered virtually eradicated in the early 2000s.
Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaxxer, acknowledged earlier this year that the best way to prevent measles infection is to be vaccinated. But he’s also peddled several false talking points about the current crisis, including wrongly stating that children were being hospitalized only for quarantine purposes — not because of the severity of the virus — and claiming that remedies like cod liver oil and Vitamin A were effective treatment, leading to parents overusing those methods and causing their children to get sick.
The HHS secretary also falsely insinuated that the vaccine doesn’t give a person lifetime protection against the measles. In fact, in most cases, the vaccine does achieve that, and where breakthrough cases do occur, the virus is milder in severity and results in fewer complications.
Speaking to Politico about the U.S. passing the 1,000-case threshold, Amesh Adalja, an expert on infectious disease and a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins University, said that Kennedy’s strategy for dealing with the crisis — downplaying its significance and offering false remedies to deal with it — could be a sign of darker things to come, both for the department he leads and the country overall.
“People always wonder — historically — how do civilizations backslide? Isn’t progress inevitable? Don’t you always go forward? This is how that kind of thing happens — you have technological progress and then people choose to abandon it,” Adalja said.