The first death by measles has been recorded in West Texas in the midst of an outbreak that has infected more than 120 people since last January. The victim had been admitted to Covenant Children’s Hospital in Lubbock due to complications caused by the disease. A press release from the Texas Department of Health and Human Services released on Wednesday confirmed the death of a “school-aged child who was not vaccinated.”
Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has so far treated the matter as nothing out of the ordinary. “There have been four measles outbreaks this year in this country — last year over 16,” he said during Trump’s first cabinet meeting today. “So it’s not unusual to have measles outbreaks every year.” Kennedy is the founder of the vaccine-opposing lobby group Children’s Defense Fund and has no formal background in medicine. In a foreword to a book published by CDF in 2021, Kennedy claimed that people “have been misled […] into believing measles is a deadly disease,” and that “oubreaks have been fabricated to create fear.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), measles is an airborne, extremely contagious disease that can be especially dangerous for infants, pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems. Those who contract it can face serious and even life-threatening complications such as pneumonia, blindness, and brain swelling. Prior to the introduction of the vaccine in 1963, 400 to 500 people died of measles per year out of 3 to 4 million cases of infection. The vaccine dropped infection rates by more than 99%, and in the year 2000, the disease had been declared eradicated in the United States, after the country went a full year with no continuous transmission of the virus.
The school vaccine coverage rate in Texas has dropped from 97 percent in the 2019-20 academic year to 94.3 percent in 2023-24, according to state health data. At the same time, the number of vaccine exemption applications doubled from 45,900 in 2018 to 93,000 in 2024.
The Washington State Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS) has issued a warning that “the best way to prevent disease is to be immunized with two doses of an MMR measles vaccine.” However, with noted vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. currently leading the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, it is likely that the lifesaving measures will not receive as much support at the federal level.
The outbreak in West Texas continues to spread, especially in the conservative Mennonite religious community in Gaines, which is known for rejecting technological, scientific, and social innovations.
