We're now all at risk

If vaccination rates don’t improve in America, deadly outbreaks of diseases that have ravaged the country will become normal again.

By Jeff Nesbit

Thanks to President Donald Trump and his health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a deadly measles outbreak has now spread to 38 states, according to government data released Wednesday. And, given that Kennedy and Health and Human Services are now actively promoting vaccine skepticism and denial at every turn, other deadly infectious diseases we’ve eradicated might come roaring back as well.

On Wednesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released new, alarming statistics on the deadly measles outbreak that has swept across America as Trump and Kennedy have turned a blind eye and embedded vaccine skepticism into health policy decisions at virtually every level inside HHS.

Measles, a highly contagious virus that can kill children and even some adults, was declared eliminated in the United States 25 years ago. Though measles usually go away in a few weeks, the virus can cause pneumonia, leading to severe medical complications.

There are now 1,288 people in the United States with a confirmed case of measles in 2025, according to the new CDC data. More than 90 percent of those cases represent instances in which people (including children) were either unvaccinated or their vaccination status was not known.

Now, in 2025, thanks to Trump and Kennedy, a measles outbreak that began in Texas and wasn’t contained according to basic, common-sense public health actions that include strong recommendations that children be vaccinated against measles, the potentially deadly virus has now spread to 38 states, the new CDC data shows.

Even more troubling, from a basic public health perspective, is the sobering fact that there have now been more measles in 2025 than in any year since 2000—the year that nearly universal childhood measles vaccinations eliminated the virus in America.

And while most of the cases of measles—which have killed three people, including two unvaccinated children and one adult—are part of an outbreak tied to an unvaccinated Mennonite community in West Texas, clusters of new measles cases have jumped to neighboring New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Kansas.

But, the CDC found, there are now cases in 38 states, from clusters in Southwestern states to isolated cases in Montana, North Dakota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky.

Any of these isolated cases in these other states in the Midwest, North and South can turn into clusters and spread from community to community, which is what’s happened in the Southwest.

It’s hard to fathom how troubling this is for public health authorities, and what an awful setback this is for the country.

What’s far worse, for millions of parents, is the knowledge that the vaccine “skepticism” being pushed by Kennedy and HHS is creating confusion for some and chipping away at the near-universal trust in vaccinations that have kept children safe in public schools in America for a quarter century.

The only way to truly stop the spread of measles in communities and schools and begin to eradicate measles again—as we did 25 years ago—is to promote vaccinations for schools and communities, which is something Kennedy simply is not doing. It generally takes about 95 percent of people in a community to be vaccinated for a virus like measles to stop being spread.

The anti-vaccine nonsense being peddled by Kennedy inside the Trump administration is putting everyone at risk. Because once near-universal vaccine levels drop below a certain point as parents decide not to vaccinate themselves or their children, the other 90-plus percent of parents and kids in that community are put at risk.

In fact, medical and public health experts are sounding the alarm right now as loudly as they can that, if vaccination rates don’t start to improve in America, deadly outbreaks of diseases that have ravaged the country will become normal again.

The new CDC data on the measles outbreak in America is a “huge red flag for the direction we’re going,” Dr. William Moss, an epidemiologist with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told The New York Times.

Moss, who has studied measles for more than 25 years, and other public health and medical experts are truly worried about the direction America is headed as anti-vaccine views based largely on conspiracy theories begin to take root in pockets across the country.

Let’s be clear about what’s happening inside Kennedy’s HHS now. He’s stacking agencies that respond to and track measles and other deadly diseases with vaccine skeptics. He and other HHS officials who report to him are actively trying to undermine confidence in vaccines. And, as a direct result, skepticism is growing.

Kennedy has downplayed the measles outbreak; remained silent about the benefits of vaccines or actively criticized their rare side effects; endorsed unproven treatments; and tried to cut HHS funding to state health departments.

Public health officials are rightly concerned that, given Kennedy’s anti-vaccine efforts throughout HHS agencies, childhood vaccination rates will continue to deteriorate in communities in parts of America, making all of us less safe.

Measles may be the first deadly virus to come roaring back, ending 25 years of eradication efforts and widespread vaccination. But it will almost certainly not be the last if the Trump administration continues to actively promote the anti-vaccine views of Kennedy’s team at HHS.

Jeff Nesbit was the assistant secretary of public affairs at HHS in the Biden administration.

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