Measles cases in South Carolina push the U.S. epidemic into its second year, threatening to end the nation’s claim to elimination of the disease.
South Carolina reported 88 new confirmed cases on Tuesday, bringing the total to 646 since the outbreak began in October.
The latest numbers come on the one-year anniversary of the Texas measles outbreak that infected more than 750 people, killed two unvaccinated children and helped push the number of U.S. cases to a 34-year high.
The Pan American Health Organization’s Measles Elimination Status Assessment Subcommittee on January 16 scheduled a special meeting in April to review the elimination status of Mexico and the US.
Countries are considered measles-free if there has been no outbreak for more than a year. The United States achieved its elimination status in 2000 after a large-scale vaccination effort. While it’s unclear whether the 2025 Texas strain is still circulating, the US could still lose its status if PAHO decides its current public health campaigns are insufficient to keep the virus under control.
A label is just a label, but its loss would confirm that the virus has regained a dangerous foothold.
Last year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recorded 2,242 confirmed cases of measles in 44 states. The Texas outbreak spread to three other states and was declared over in August. Months later, outbreaks broke out in South Carolina and others on the Utah-Arizona border.
This year, the U.S. reported 171 cases in nine states through Jan. 13, largely driven by South Carolina’s numbers. On January 17, Clemson University reported its first case of measles on the Columbia, South Carolina campus. Anderson University also reported the case.
A total of 538 people in South Carolina are under quarantine after being exposed to the virus at several elementary, middle and high schools and grocery stores.
“We are nowhere close to where we need to be to say this epidemic is over,” infectious disease expert and former CDC official Demetre Daskalakis told reporters Tuesday.
Before a vaccine became available in 1963, nearly every child before the age of 15 contracted measles, and the virus killed 400 to 500 Americans a year. But vaccination coverage in the US has been declining in recent years.
“It’s not just that we’ve pretty much eliminated measles,” said Paul Offit, a pediatrician and director of the Center for Vaccine Education at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. “We’ve removed the memory of measles, so people just aren’t afraid of it.”
Measles is highly contagious and can lead to encephalitis and pneumonia. The measles, mumps and rubella vaccine is 97% effective after two doses.
During the Texas outbreak, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. promoted unproven measles drugs such as vitamin A and cod liver oil. Local hospitals began seeing more children with vitamin A toxicity after his comments.
Misinformation is one of the biggest challenges for local health departments on the front lines of the epidemic, said Chrissie Juliano, executive director of the Coalition for Greater Cities Health. “The most important thing right now is to get people vaccinated,” she said.
This article was generated from an automated news agency source without text modification.
