By Mariam Sunny and Siddhi Mahatole
Aug 25 (Reuters) – Two Pennsylvania residents died from measles, health officials said on Tuesday, the first such deaths this year in the United States, which is contending with the highest number of cases of the highly infectious disease in more than three decades as vaccination rates drop.
Both people were unvaccinated residents of Lancaster County, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health, which did not release additional details, citing privacy concerns.
Pennsylvania has been one of the hardest hit states this year, with 393 measles cases across 28 counties so far. Lancaster County, in the southeastern part of the state, has had 185 cases, but these were the first measles deaths recorded in the state in 35 years.
“Because measles was largely eliminated in the Commonwealth for more than three decades, people are not familiar with this disease and don’t fully understand the potential severity of the illness,” said Pennsylvania Secretary of Health Debra Bogen.
The United States has had 2,777 confirmed cases so far this year of a disease that had been largely eradicated in the country, a reflection of declining vaccination rates and policies under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has worked for decades to discourage the use of vaccines.
Kennedy and President Donald Trump, who earlier this month issued an executive order calling for a reduction in recommended childhood vaccines, have promoted a long-debunked link between vaccines and autism contrary to established scientific evidence.
Trump’s executive order doesn’t help restore trust in life-saving vaccines, said Dr. Angela Dunn, former Utah state epidemiologist and previously a CDC division director in infectious disease response.
“We all thought the Texas outbreak and the deaths there last year would be a wake-up call. Then we had the outbreaks in South Carolina and Utah,” Dunn said. In 2025, three people died in an outbreak that began in West Texas and spread to New Mexico.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
FALLING VACCINATION RATES
Vaccination rates of 95% or higher can prevent outbreaks by creating what is known as herd immunity that protects people unable to be vaccinated.
Two doses of the Measles-Mumps-Rubella shot provide 97% protection against the virus. Children typically first receive the vaccine when they are 12 to 15 months old and again at age 4 to 6 years of age.
According to Pennsylvania Department of Health data for the 2025-2026 school year, 93.2% of Pennsylvania kindergarten-age children had received the required two doses of MMR vaccine, down from 93.7% during the 2024-2025 school year.
In Lancaster County, 87.6% of kindergarten students received the required two MMR doses during the 2025-2026 school year.
The federal government and state health officials need to try to identify communities that have low measles vaccination coverage, said William Moss, an epidemiology professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
“Many people in this country and in certain communities have a mistrust of measles vaccine partly fed by misinformation and disinformation,” Moss said.
The number of U.S. measles cases in 2026 is the highest in a single year since the major resurgence between 1989 and 1991, when 55,000 infections and 123 deaths were recorded.
South Carolina earlier this year experienced the nation’s largest measles outbreak with nearly 1,000 infections over six months. It was declared over in April.
(Reporting by Mariam Sunny and Siddhi Mahatole in Bengaluru; additional reporting by Chad Terhune; Editing by Caroline Humer and Bill Berkrot)
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