There have now been more measles cases in 2025 than in any other year since the contagious virus was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000 ….
The grim milestone represents an alarming setback for the country’s public health and heightens concerns that if childhood vaccination rates do not improve, deadly outbreaks of measles — once considered a disease of the past — will become the new normal.
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“It’s a huge red flag for the direction in which we’re going,” said Dr. William Moss, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who has studied measles for more than 25 years.
In total, 1,288 people have had a confirmed case of measles this year, 92 percent of whom were unvaccinated or whose vaccination status was unknown.
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Efforts from local public health officials to contain outbreaks have also been hamstrung by the new health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has downplayed the outbreak, offered only muted support of vaccines and endorsed unproven treatments for the virus.
