As a measles outbreak in Texas has grown to nearly 150 cases, US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in an opinion piece on Fox News on Sunday that parents should consult with health-care providers “to understand their options to get the MMR vaccine” for their children.
Kennedy did not explicitly recommend the vaccine, but said the outbreak was a “call to action for all of us to reaffirm our commitment to public health.”
“The decision to vaccinate is a personal one,” Kennedy wrote. “Vaccines not only protect individual children from measles, but also contribute to community immunity, protecting those who are unable to be vaccinated due to medical reasons.”
Kennedy’s statement on measles vaccination appeared in the piece after a paragraph emphasizing treatment, such as vitamin A, for people who are sick. There is no approved antiviral to treat measles.
Kennedy also wrote that health-care providers, leaders and policymakers need to ensure that “accurate information about vaccine safety and efficacy is disseminated. We must engage with communities to understand their concerns, provide culturally competent education, and make vaccines readily accessible for all those who want them.” In a post on X on Friday, Kennedy had said that HHS was providing technical support and vaccines to the state of Texas, as well as lab support, outreach materials in Low German — a language commonly used by the Mennonite community in West Texas — and daily communication with local officials.
Still, Kennedy’s vaccine comments are in striking contrast to those from former HHS Sec. Alex Azar during the last large measles outbreak in 2019: “We cannot say this enough: Vaccines are a safe and highly effective public health tool that can prevent this disease and end the current outbreak. The measles vaccine is among the most-studied medical products we have and is given safely to millions of children and adults each year. I encourage all Americans to talk to your doctor about what vaccines are recommended to protect you, your family, and your community from measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases.”
Kennedy has a history of antivaccine comments, including saying “no vaccine is safe and effective” and tying vaccines to the rise in autism. Studies have found the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine is safe and effective: Two doses of the MMR vaccine are 97% effective and studies have shown there’s no link between autism and the MMR vaccine. During the Texas outbreak, the US Centers for Disease Control and local health officials have continued to recommend vaccination against measles.
However, MMR vaccine coverage is declining across the country. For four years, the US has fallen short of the 95% threshold set by HHS to help prevent outbreaks of the highly contagious disease.
The outbreak in West Texas has led to 146 measles cases since late January, the majority of them among people who are unvaccinated or whose vaccination status is unknown. There have been 20 patients hospitalized and one death, an unvaccinated school-age child, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. It’s the largest outbreak the state has seen in 30 years, officials say.
When asked about the outbreak during President Donald Trump’s first cabinet meeting last week, Kennedy said that “measles outbreaks are not unusual.” However, measles was eliminated in the US in 2000. Experts say some cases are still expected — particularly imported cases associated with international travel — and the US has reported at least a dozen cases each year since reaching elimination status, according to data from the CDC. However, infectious disease experts and local health officials said outbreaks the size and speed of the Texas outbreak are unusual since vaccination became available.
In the decade before the introduction of the MMR vaccine in 1963, there were 400 to 500 US measles deaths per year. Until the death of the child in Texas, there had not been a measles death in the US since 2015 and the country had not seen a measles death in a child since 2003.
Measles cases have risen in recent years, with 285 US cases reported last year, the most since 2019 when prolonged outbreaks among under vaccinated communities in New York threatened elimination status, according to the CDC. Declining vaccination rates are driving up the number of cases.