The US is seeing its worst measles outbreak in more than three decades, with cases already exceeding last year’s record total and raising fresh concerns about the nation’s elimination status.
Measles, a highly infectious virus, has surged to 2,295 recorded cases – the highest total in 35 years, according to the Johns Hopkins US Measles Tracker.
As of Tuesday, the nationwide case count had already surpassed all of 2025 by nine infections. Last year ended with 2,289 reported cases.
South Carolina, Utah, Texas, Virginia and Florida have reported the highest case counts in 2026, with 671, 514, 186, 177 and 141 cases, respectively. There have also been 34 new outbreaks this year.
The last time measles cases surpassed this year’s total was in 1991, when the nation reported 9,643 infections.
For the past 25 years, measles has been considered eliminated in the US, meaning the country has not experienced sustained domestic transmission of the virus for 12 months or longer. But this year’s surge in cases is putting that status at risk.
Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, who initially downplayed the effectiveness of the MMR vaccine, has since u-turned and endorsed vaccination as outbreaks have spread.
RFK Jr previously chaired the anti-vaccine nonprofit called Children’s Health Defense, which advocated for an end to school vaccine requirements during the measles outbreak in 2019, when 1,261 cases of measles were reported across 31 states.
In extreme cases, measles can lead to severe inflammation and swelling in the brain and deadly pneumonia caused by fluid build up in the lungs
He backtracked in April 2025 during a visit to West Texas where he visited families whose children died from the measles outbreak that occurred in the state, telling the public that the MMR vaccine is the ‘most effective way’ to stave off the potentially dangerous virus.
A significant measles outbreak that started last year in the South Plains region of Texas, primarily within a largely unvaccinated religious community, quickly spread across state lines to the rest of the country.
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Texas recorded 762 measles cases and two deaths by August 2025, marking the state’s largest outbreak since 1992, when 990 cases were linked to a single outbreak, according to state health officials.
The outbreak primarily spread among unvaccinated school-age children living along the state’s Gulf of America coastline. Two young girls died, including an eight-year-old.
No measles deaths have been recorded this year, but about six percent – 146 patients – have been hospitalized.
Measles is characterized by cough, fever, and a blotchy rash that starts on the face before spreading down the body.
The virus is highly contagious, if one person has it, up to 9 out of 10 people who come into close contact with that person will become infected if they are not vaccinated.
The virus is 97 percent preventable with the two-dose MMR vaccine, which is given to children between 12 and 15 months of age and again between four and six years old.
Measles spreads through direct contact with infectious droplets or through the air.
Patients with a measles infection are contagious from four days before the rash through four days after the rash appears.
Enclosed areas like airports and planes are extremely risky locations for disease transmission.
Robert F Kennedy Jr has pulled a major about-face when it comes to concerning rises in measles cases, telling the public that the MMR vaccine is the ‘most effective way’ to stave off the potentially dangerous virus
Cold-like symptoms, such as a fever, cough and a runny or blocked nose, are usually the first signal of measles
It first invades the respiratory system, then spreads to the lymph nodes and throughout the body. As a result, the virus can affect the lungs, brain and central nervous system.
While measles sometimes causes milder symptoms, including diarrhea, sore throat and achiness, it leads to pneumonia in roughly six percent of otherwise healthy children, and more often in malnourished children.
Though the brain swelling that measles can trigger is rare, occurring in about one in 1,000 cases, it is deadly in roughly 15 to 20 percent of those who develop it, while about 20 percent are left with permanent neurological damage, such as brain damage, deafness or intellectual disability.
Measles also severely damages a child’s immune system, making them susceptible to other potentially devastating bacterial and viral infections they were previously protected against.
Before MMR vaccines became available in the 1960s, measles caused epidemics with up to 2.6 million global deaths every year. By 2023, that number had fallen to roughly 107,000 deaths.
