Measles Cases Top 4,000

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined. 

From CDC:

As of October 8, 2026, 4,080 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 4,062 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 18 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 42 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 96% of confirmed cases (3,897 of 4,080) are outbreak-associated (2,513 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,384 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

Measles: Pennsylvania Outbreak, New York Emergency

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined. 

Mike Stobbe at AP:

Pennsylvania has surpassed 1,000 measles cases this year, state health officials said Monday, making it the largest state outbreak in more than three decades.

The U.S. is enduring its worst year for measles since 1991, with nearly 3,900 reported cases, according to the CDC. The nation has seen eight reported measles-associated deaths in the past two years — more than the combined total of reported deaths over the previous three decades.

...
It’s been decades since a U.S. state has seen an outbreak surpass 1,000 cases, stretching back to a multiyear outbreak in New York City in the early 1990s that infected more than 4,500 people.

The nation eliminated the domestic spread of measles in 2000 by maintaining high vaccination rates, but those rates have fallen in recent years to below the 95% coverage needed to prevent outbreaks.

In November, international health officials will meet to determine if the U.S. and Mexico have lost their measles-free status.

Joseph Goldstein at NYT:

Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a statewide health emergency in New York State on Monday as measles cases increased dangerously across rural counties where vaccination rates have lagged.

As of Saturday, 108 measles cases had been reported across the state this year, the most since 2019, when New York was the epicenter of a national outbreak. Most of the cases are in rural areas, concentrated in the Finger Lakes region.

Ms. Hochul’s declaration will relax rules about who can administer vaccines to make it easier for midwives, pharmacists and other health care workers to give shots to prevent measles.

“After reviewing the latest data on measles cases in New York State, I am declaring a state disaster emergency to strengthen our ongoing efforts to confront this disease,” the governor said. “No one should get seriously ill or die from a vaccine-preventable disease.”

Survey on Vaccines and Autism

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the discredited notion that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread.   And among those diseases could be measles and COVID-19.

Antivaxxers are sometimes violent, often abusive, and always wrong.

 Annenberg Public Policy Center:

The number of measles cases in the United States is at the highest level in decades, attributed to a decrease in vaccination against measles. And while U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told American parents on Aug. 2 that they should get their children vaccinated against measles, the public remains evenly divided on whether or not he recommends the MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccine.

According to the latest nationally representative survey from the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) of the University of Pennsylvania, conducted Aug. 4-17, 2026, among more than 1,900 U.S. adults, the proportion of adults who say Kennedy recommends that children be vaccinated against measles is just under a third, at 31%. While this represents a significant increase since August 2025, when 23% of Americans thought he recommended measles vaccination for children, most people either still think that Kennedy does not recommend the vaccine (29%) or are unsure whether or not he recommends it (40%). The public is evenly divided between those who think Kennedy does (31%) or does not (29%) recommend the vaccine.

A longtime vaccine skeptic, Kennedy has as HHS secretary made misleading and unsupported claims about the MMR vaccine, the measles, and vaccination in general, according to FactCheck.org, a project of APPC. He also has downplayed the risks of measles and the 2025 measles outbreak in Texas.

“As measles cases rise and the U.S. is poised to lose its measles elimination status, this country is paying the price for skepticism about vaccination against measles that RFK Jr. played a central role in promoting,” said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, APPC’s director emerita. “His ability to address the current U.S. measles outbreaks is hampered by the fact that most adults are either unsure about his stand on childhood vaccination against measles or believe that he does not recommend it.”

...

A majority (68%) of respondents say that it is false to state that “vaccines given to children for diseases like measles, mumps, and rubella cause autism,” while 13% say that statement is true and 19% are not sure. These percentages are statistically unchanged since 2022. In June of 2021, however, significantly more (74%) thought it was false to claim there is a link between vaccines and autism.

Just over half (52%) think that children who are fully vaccinated are “about as likely” to show signs of autism as children who are not fully vaccinated, while 9% think fully vaccinated children are “more likely,” 12% believe they are “less likely,” and 28% are not sure of the likelihood. Those saying fully vaccinated children are “more likely” to show signs of autism has decreased from 12% in February 2026.

“This small decrease in endorsing a link between vaccination and autism is good news in our survey data,” says Ken Winneg, APPC’s managing director of survey research. “However, when looking at the same people over time, there is no relationship between accurate change in knowledge of RFK Jr.’s recommendations and decreases in endorsing this misbelief.”

Measles 10/2/26

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined. 

From CDC:

As of October 1, 2026, 3,887 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 3,869 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 18 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 42 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 95% of confirmed cases (3,700 of 3,887) are outbreak-associated (2,316 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,384 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

Measles, Late September 2026

  In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined. 

From CDC:

As of September 24, 2026, 3,659 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 3,642 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 17 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 40 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 95% of confirmed cases (3,478 of 3,659) are outbreak-associated (2,094 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,384 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

Mister Measles

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined. 

CDC:

As of September 17, 2026, 3,471 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 3,454 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 17 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 39 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 95% of confirmed cases (3,296 of 3,471) are outbreak-associated (1,920 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,376 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

Jessica McDonald at FactCheck.org:

It’s difficult to directly compare measles outbreak responses across countries, experts told us, which makes Kennedy’s claim that the U.S. has done “better” than any other country a bit squishy. 

But a reasonable place to start is with the per capita rate over the same period of time, Ana Bento, an assistant professor of infectious disease ecology at Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, told us. And on that measure, the U.S. is nowhere near the best.

According to measles data from the World Health Organization, as of Sept. 14, the U.S. had 13.2 measles cases per 1 million people in 2026. That’s the 65th highest rate of measles in the world for 2026, out of 169 nations with data. That places it in the worst 38% of nations, and about as good as Russia.

For 2025, the U.S. did slightly better, but with the 86th highest measles rate out of 184 nations, it still ranked in the lower half of countries for the fewest measles cases per population.

 Melody Schreiber at The Guardian:

As the death toll from the worst measles outbreak in decades rises, Robert F Kennedy Jr headlined the Washington DC conference of the anti-vaccine organization Children’s Health Defense, which he led for nearly two decades.

“Let me be clear. You have a strong and steadfast friend at the White House,” Kennedy, now serving as secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), told anti-vaccine activists at the conference in a nearly hour-and-a-half-long speech. He urged patience, saying that he would’ve made sweeping changes “on day one” but that he had to follow the law in order to make permanent change.

“But as I said, you have friends in the White House, and we are doing this one day at a time,” Kennedy said.

He only addressed the measles outbreak, which recently killed four people in Pennsylvania, once.

“In our country we care about rare illnesses and deaths. We care about every child who dies from measles. They get headlines,” he said. “I’d ask you to care about children who are dying or suffering or being injured by vaccine injuries.”

Yet Another Measles Death

  In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined.

 
Dani Blum at NYT:

Pennsylvania health officials announced on Tuesday that a fourth person in the state had died from measles, making 2026 the deadliest year for measles in the United States since the virus was declared eliminated in 2000.

The Mifflin County coroner’s office said an 18-year-old died from a rare neurological complication of measles. The person was not vaccinated, according to the state health department.

A coroner from another Pennsylvania county announced this week that a 40-year-old unvaccinated woman had died from measles complications. On Tuesday, that coroner, Greg Furlong, said that testing had confirmed the woman had contracted measles. Last month, state health officials reported the deaths of two infants who had measles.

Pennsylvania is facing a rapidly expanding measles outbreak that has sickened nearly 700 people and hospitalized more than 130 people. But there are likely to be many more measles cases that have not been reported, said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. There are roughly one to three deaths for every 1,000 cases of measles, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suggesting that the true case count in Pennsylvania is higher.

Measles deaths have been very rare in the United States since the disease was declared eliminated from the country in 2000. But as measles has come roaring back, more deaths have occurred. In 2025, two children and an unvaccinated adult died of measles, the first such deaths in a decade.

 

Remember the tragic measles epidemic and recent deaths in Pennsylvania are still modest relative to what could be in store for us in February March April 2027. In the pre-vaccine era measles reliably peaked in late winter and early spring. And sure enough as antivaccine activism… pic.twitter.com/4zRVwJop6e

— Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD DSc(hon) (@PeterHotez) September 13, 2026

Another Measles Death

  In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined.

 Teddy Rosenbluth at NYT:

A 40-year-old unvaccinated woman in Pennsylvania died Saturday, most likely because of measles complications, the Jefferson County coroner, Greg Furlong, said Sunday.

The news comes as Pennsylvania faces a rapidly expanding outbreak that has already sickened more than 670 people and hospitalized 124. The state department of health reported two deaths related to the outbreak last month, which set off a frenzied debate over whether the deaths were a result of measles or merely coincided with the infection.

In this woman’s case, the immediate cause of death was respiratory failure “due to suspected measles,” according to a preliminary death certificate viewed by The Times. Mr. Furlong said that testing had not yet confirmed the woman had measles, though she had many of the symptoms of the virus — including the telltale rash that often starts as flat red spots on the face and travels down the body — and had recently been exposed to someone with measles. A nasal swab will be sent to the state laboratory to be tested for measles, Mr. Furlong said.

The woman had several chronic medical conditions that made her vulnerable to severe complications from measles. She had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, or C.O.P.D., and was on 24/7 supplemental oxygen.

The state health department has not included the death in its official tally but has been in close contact with Mr. Furlong, he said.

While most measles cases are mild, roughly one in five unvaccinated people in the United States who contract the virus lands in the hospital, often for complications such as pneumonia, severe dehydration and brain swelling. The virus is especially dangerous for young children, adults older than 20 and those who have a compromised immune system.

3,294 Measles Cases

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined.

From CDC:

As of September 10, 2026, 3,294 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 3,278 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 16 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 38 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 95% of confirmed cases (3,123 of 3,294) are outbreak-associated (1,748 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,375 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

Autism and the Amish

In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.

Since President Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined.

Carmen Paun at POLITICO:

This time, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and the Lancaster County coroner agree: An infant died of measles in the state, the first confirmed death in 35 years.

Shapiro cited the coroner’s confirmation Friday on X and took another jab at Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who said last week the Democrat’s staff might have fabricated the death to make Kennedy look bad.

“Instead of listening to the real doctors and public health experts, RFK chose to sow doubt, play politics, direct the CDC not to acknowledge these deaths, and even accuse me of fabricating these tragedies,” Shapiro posted on the social media platform.

The county coroner, Stephen Diamantoni, has previously said he disagreed with Shapiro about the cause of death of another newborn, an Amish boy who died soon after birth last month. Diamantoni said the baby, who had measles, died of a ruptured spleen and that he did not believe measles contributed.

Shapiro and his health department said last week that two Pennsylvanians had died of “measles-associated” causes.

Diamantoni said earlier Friday a 6-week-old girl from the county’s Amish community died of measles at home last month. The baby had microcephaly, a condition that usually leads to death by six months of age, but measles was the cause of death, Diamantoni said, according to local media reports.

When contacted by POLITICO, Pennsylvania’s health department did not directly say the baby is the second measles-associated death it reported last week, but Press Secretary Neil Ruhland reaffirmed there were two deaths in an email statement. “The Lancaster County Coroner has now publicly confirmed a second infant death involving measles,” Ruhland said.

Shapiro’s X post, referencing the coroner’s office, implied that this case is the second one he referred to last week.

The Amish community has long had low vaccination rates. Neither of the two babies was old enough to receive a measles vaccine, which is typically given at age 1.

Alice Gibbs at Newsweek:

David Mandell, the director of the Penn Center for Mental Health and a professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania whose research focuses on autism services and policy, told Newsweek that claims that Amish communities do not experience autism are inaccurate.

"It's untrue to say that Amish communities have no autism," Mandell said.

He said measuring autism prevalence in Amish communities can be particularly difficult because diagnoses often depend on parental reporting and access to specialists.

"Autism is behaviorally determined and highly reliant on parent report," Mandell said, adding that prevalence studies can be challenging in communities where families may be less likely to discuss developmental concerns with outsiders.

The Amish are often cited in vaccine debates because some communities have lower immunization rates than the wider U.S. population.

An article published by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that Amish communities generally have lower vaccination uptake, although vaccination practices vary significantly between settlements and families.

Experts caution against treating the Amish as a single, uniform population. Different communities can have different health care practices, levels of engagement with doctors and attitudes toward vaccination.

That distinction is important because claims about "the Amish" often imply that all Amish children are unvaccinated, when vaccination practices can differ considerably among communities and households.

Mandell likewise cautioned against treating Amish communities as uniformly unvaccinated.

"Amish people do get vaccinated," he said. "While the vaccination rates are much lower than the surrounding populations, more than half of Amish children do get vaccinated

 

Measles, Early September 2026

 In The Politics of Autism, I analyze the myth that vaccines cause autism. This bogus idea can hurt people by allowing diseases to spread. Examples include measles, COVID, flu, and polio. A top antivaxxer is HHS Secretary RFK Jr. He is part of the "Disinformation Dozen." He helped cause a deadly 2019 measles outbreak in Samoa.  Last year, he lied about it under oath.

Since  Trump took office in 2025, the U.S. has recorded more confirmed measles cases than in the previous 20 years combined.

CDC:

As of September 3, 2026, 3,134 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States in 2026. Among these, 3,118 measles cases were reported by 47 jurisdictions: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. A total of 16 measles cases were reported among international visitors to the United States.

There have been 38 new outbreaks** reported in 2026, and 95% of confirmed cases (2,969 of 3,134) are outbreak-associated (1,594 from outbreaks starting in 2026 and 1,375 from outbreaks that started in 2025).

For the full year of 2025, a total of 2,289 confirmed* measles cases were reported in the United States.

American Oversight:

Thursday, American Oversight launched an investigation into the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) apparently manipulated reporting surrounding two measles-associated deaths reported by the Pennsylvania Department of Health. The alterations reportedly came at the command of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

We filed Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests with HHS and CDC seeking records that could shed light on why the agency departed from its normal classification practices and altered its public reporting on the deaths following Secretary Kennedy’s demands as well as unsubstantiated claims that the data may have been “manipulated” by Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.

The investigation comes amid a nationwide rise in measles cases, including in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, home to the largest current outbreak in the country. On August 25, the Pennsylvania Department of Health confirmed two measles-associated deaths of unvaccinated residents, the state’s first deaths linked to the virus in 35 years. One of the deaths involved a newborn who died shortly after birth. The baby’s mother had reportedly been severely ill with measles during her pregnancy. Under standard CDC practice, deaths reported by state health departments — including deaths that occurred in Texas and New Mexico during last year’s outbreak — are included in the agency’s national tally and the CDC does not challenge the state’s determination.

According to reporting by multiple outlets, newly confirmed CDC Director Erica Schwartz directed agency staff to exclude the two Pennsylvania deaths from its measles outbreak web page, which is typically updated each Friday. The demanded change reportedly came directly from Kennedy. The web page update was delayed until Sunday, August 30, and the dashboard’s national death total changed several times over the weekend before the agency added a note stating, “At this time, available information does not establish whether measles caused or contributed to the deaths or whether the individuals died from other causes while infected with measles.” CDC employees reportedly said the repeated changes stemmed from confusion among staff about what they were supposed to do.

The CDC’s break from standard practice came after Secretary Kennedy publicly accused Governor Shapiro of “manipulating” the truth and suggested on social media, without evidence, that the two deaths may even have been “fabricated” by Shapiro’s staff. The repeated dashboard revisions raise the question of whether the CDC’s public data was reshaped to align with Secretary Kennedy’s demands and political messaging rather than with the agency’s own longstanding classification practice.

State health officials, who classified the deaths as “measles-associated,” have stood by their findings.