An unvaccinated child has died in first U.S. measles death since 2015
A child in Texas has died from measles, officials said Wednesday, the first known death in the current large outbreak in West Texas and the first death from measles in the country since 2015.
The individual, described as a school-aged child, was not vaccinated. The gender and previous health status of the child was not disclosed.
The person had been hospitalized in Lubbock. So far in this outbreak 18 people in Texas have been hospitalized with measles, the state’s health and human services department said in a statement.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s health secretary and a longtime critic of the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine, appeared to try to downplay the news in a press conference after a Cabinet meeting in the White House.
“We are following the measles epidemic every day. I think there’s 124 people who have contracted measles at this point, mainly in Gaines County, Texas. Mainly, we’re told, in the Mennonite community,” he said in response to a question. “There are two people who have died, but we are watching it, and there are about 20 people hospitalized, being quarantined.”
“Incidentally, there have been four measles outbreaks this year in this country. Last year there were 16. So it’s not unusual, we have measles outbreaks every year,” Kennedy said.
STAT has not been able to confirm that there have been two deaths from measles so far this year. A spokesperson at HHS did not immediately respond to a request for clarification. STAT also asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for comment on the Texas death and was told comment would have to come from HHS.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), a physician who is a fervent supporter of vaccines and who grilled Kennedy about his positions on them during his Senate confirmation process, commented on the death on the social media platform X.
“Absolutely devastating news. Encouraging parents to make sure their child is up-to-date on their vaccines. The measles vaccine is safe and effective,” Cassidy posted.
Cassidy admitted during the confirmation process that he was having trouble with the idea of voting for Kennedy, because of his long history of questioning the safety of vaccines and disregarding evidence that disproves some of the claims he has made. But in the end, the Louisiana senator voted to confirm Kennedy.
Infectious diseases experts were dismayed by the news of the death of the child in Texas.
“It’s really sad because this is clearly preventable,” said Walter Orenstein, an infectious diseases specialist at Emory University in Atlanta. “I’m just really concerned that this was a completely needless and presumably totally preventable death.”
Measles is one of the most infectious diseases known to humankind. In the pre-vaccine era, large annual outbreaks were common and between 400 and 500 children a year would die from measles in the United States, Orenstein noted. In more recent years, measles cases in this country have tallied in the dozens or low hundreds. In 2019, however, a large and long-running outbreak in New York state fueled a spike in cases. That year nearly 1,300 confirmed cases were recorded.
In addition to the measles cases in Texas, nine cases have been detected in New Mexico.
Given that there has already been a death in Texas, the outbreak may be substantially larger than the number of confirmed cases suggest, said Paul Offit, an infectious diseases expert at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Offit noted that the death rate from measles is roughly one fatality per 1,000 cases.
The measles death comes in Kennedy’s’s second week as the head of HHS. Although his tenure there has been short, there have already been signs he may substantially change vaccine policy in the United States. A key expert group that advises the CDC on how to use vaccines was to meet this week, but that meeting was postponed, with no date given when it will be rescheduled. The CDC was instructed to take down some paid promotional campaigns for vaccines, including a popular “Wild to Mild” campaign for flu shots, because Kennedy wants vaccine campaigns to focus more on “informed consent.”
Kennedy has long argued that a number of vaccines are not safe and has persisted in linking the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine to rising autism rates, even though the 1998 study that posited a link between the two was later withdrawn and multiple studies have found no link between the vaccine and autism. He has earned substantial amounts of money from his promotion of anti-vaccine views, including through speeches, writing books, founding and running Children’s Health Defense, a group that challenges the safety of vaccines, and as a lawyer who has sued vaccine manufacturers.
So far in 2025 at least eight jurisdictions have reported measles cases, according to the CDC: Alaska, California, Georgia, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, Rhode Island, and Texas. The CDC’s measles count website is only updated monthly and though the most recent update was on Feb. 20, it is already out of date. It lists the national count so far this year at 93 cases, but the Texas outbreak alone exceeds that number.
https://www.statnews.com/2025/02/26/texas-measles-outbreak-death/
