By Amy Maxmen

Measles Outbreak:

The measles outbreak emerged three weeks ago and the Texas health department has confirmed 90 cases with 16 hospitalizations, as of 21 February 2024. Most of those infected are under the age of 18 years. Officials suspect that nine additional measles cases reported in New Mexico, across the border from the epicenter of the Texas outbreak in Gaines County, are linked to the Texas outbreak. Ongoing investigations seek to confirm that connection.

Cause of Concern:

Health officials worry they are missing cases. Undetected infections bode poorly for communities because doctors and health officials can’t contain transmission if they can’t identify who is infected.

Amid an outbreak that displays the toll of measles in under-vaccinated pockets of America, Texas lawmakers have filed about 25 bills in this year’s legislative session that could limit vaccination further.

Some parents might not be taking their children to the clinics where they could be tested, said Katherine Wells, the public health director in Lubbock, Texas. “If your kids are responding to fever reducers and you’re keeping hydrated, some people may keep them at home,” she said.

Escalation of cases:

→ Most unvaccinated people will contract measles if they’re exposed to the airborne virus, which can linger for up to two hours, indoors.

→ Those infected can spread the disease before they have symptoms.

→ Around 1 in 5 people with measles end up hospitalized, 1 in 10 children develop ear infections that can lead to permanent hearing loss, and about 1 in 1,000 children die from respiratory and neurological conditions.

· Local health officials have been trying to persuade the parents of unvaccinated children to protect their kids by bringing them to pop-up clinics offering measles vaccines.

· Local health departments are also operating mobile testing units outside schools in an attempt to detect infections before they spread.

· They are staffing clinics that can provide treatment prophylactically for infants exposed to the virus, who are too young for vaccination. Local health officials are advising day care centers on how to protect young children and babies, and educating school nurses on how to spot signs of the disease.

· Zach Holbrooks, executive director of the South Plains Public Health District, which includes Gaines, said health officials were following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, as of last year, by advising schools to keep unvaccinated children home for 21 days if they shared a classroom or the cafeteria with someone infected. This means that many parents may need to stay home from work to care for their kids.

What the Health Experts say:

Public health researchers expect such outbreaks to become larger and more common because of scores of laws around the U.S. — pending and recently passed — that ultimately lower vaccine rates by allowing parents to exempt their children from vaccine requirements at public schools and some private schools.

Such policies are coupled with misinformation about childhood vaccination now platformed at the highest levels of government. The new director of the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has erroneously blamed vaccines for autism, pointing to discredited theories shown to be untrue by more than a dozen scientific studies.

In Kennedy’s first week on the job, HHS postponed an important meeting of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, without saying when it would resume. In addition, the CDC’s letter template to school principals, advising unvaccinated children to remain home from school for 21 days if they’ve been exposed to the measles virus, is no longer on the agency’s website. An old version remains posted on its archive.

This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

(KFF/SD)