Latest news with #MorbidityandMortalityWeeklyReport
Yahoo
26-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Measles confirmed in L.A. County resident who recently returned from Texas
Measles has been confirmed in a Los Angeles County resident who recently returned from Texas, a state that is in the midst of an outbreak of the highly infectious disease, health officials said Friday. The outbreak in Texas is one of the worst seen in the U.S. in years, and it has claimed the lives of two school-aged children who were unvaccinated and had no underlying medical conditions, according to a report published Thursday in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. This is the third measles case reported by the L.A. County Department of Public Health so far this year. In March, a county resident who had recently traveled through Los Angeles International Airport on a China Airlines flight from Taipei, Taiwan, tested positive. And in February, a case was reported in a non-L.A. County resident who arrived on a Korean Air flight from Seoul. "The traveler was not infectious during the time of travel," the county Department of Public Health said in a statement Friday regarding the most recent case. Read more: Measles cases exploded in Texas after stagnant vaccine funding. New cuts threaten the same across U.S. Officials are working to identify people who may have been exposed while the infected person was contagious with the virus. Symptoms of measles include a high fever — above 101 degrees — cough, runny nose, red and watery eyes and a rash, which usually starts on the face and spreads to the rest of the body. Measles spreads easily through the air and can remain airborne and on surfaces for hours, even after an infectious person has left the room. People can spread measles to others from four days before the disease's telltale rash appears through four days afterward, according to the CDC. People who have not been immunized against measles, either through vaccination or prior infection, are at risk of getting sick between seven and 21 days after exposure. Read more: The U.S. is approaching a dangerous measles precipice, scientists say Two doses of the measles vaccine are 97% effective against infection, health officials say. CDC officials have identified 10 measles outbreaks nationwide. The largest began in a close-knit community with low vaccination rates in Texas' Gaines County, adjacent to New Mexico. That outbreak has since spread to New Mexico and Oklahoma, and is suspected to be linked to more cases in Kansas, the CDC report said. A growing outbreak in the Mexican state of Chihuahua was also reported after a resident fell ill after visiting Gaines County. So far this year, 884 measles cases have been reported nationwide, "the second-highest annual case count in 25 years," according to the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Read more: Measles exposure at LAX amid growing cases across U.S. How to protect yourself During all of 2024, 285 measles cases were reported nationally. Of the cases reported so far this year, the median patient age was 8. About one-third of those infected were younger than 5, the report said. Among all measles patients, 96% were not vaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. Nationally, 85 measles patients this year have had to be hospitalized. Except for one, all of them were either unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. Texas officials have said the cause of the state's latest measles death was measles pulmonary failure. Most of the measles cases reported so far nationally this year are tied to close-knit communities with low vaccination coverage, the CDC said. Read more: Independent study charter schools are a soft spot in California's vaccine laws, data show Before Friday's announcement, nine measles cases had been reported in California this year, with cases also reported in Orange, Riverside, Fresno, San Mateo, Placer and Tuolumne counties, according to the California Department of Public Health. In 2024, California confirmed 15 cases of measles. In 2023, the total was only four. California's worst measles outbreak in recent memory occurred between December 2014 and April 2015. Centered at Disneyland, the outbreak resulted in about 131 Californians getting infected. People from six other states, Mexico and Canada were also sickened, according to the California Department of Public Health. Following that outbreak, California lawmakers strengthened childhood vaccination requirements for schoolchildren. For the 2023-24 academic year, 96.2% of California's kindergartners were vaccinated against measles, mumps and rubella. Read more: Fewer California kindergarten students immunized against measles last year, new data show That's slightly down from the 96.5% seen the year prior. But it remains above the levels recorded before the Disneyland measles outbreak, which were less than 94%. Public health experts say they aim for a 95% measles vaccination rate to guard against outbreaks. Amid the ongoing outbreaks, pediatricians have stepped up efforts to rebut misinformation about both the disease and the vaccine. "The measles vaccine is safe and effective," the American Academy of Pediatrics said in a recent statement, rebutting what they called "wellness influencers and anti-vaccine advocates" who they say "falsely assert" that getting vaccinated "is as dangerous as contracting measles itself." "Extensive research demonstrates that the MMR vaccine is safe and significantly reduces the risk of contracting measles, a disease that can lead to severe complications and death," the pediatrics group said. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
26-04-2025
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
Measles confirmed in L.A. County resident who recently returned from Texas
Measles has been confirmed in a Los Angeles County resident who recently returned from Texas, a state that is in the midst of an outbreak of the highly infectious disease, health officials said Friday. The outbreak in Texas is one of the worst seen in the U.S. in years, and it has claimed the lives of two school-aged children who were unvaccinated and had no underlying medical conditions, according to a report published Thursday in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. This is the third measles case reported by the L.A. County Department of Public Health so far this year. In March, a county resident who had recently traveled through Los Angeles International Airport on a China Airlines flight from Taipei, Taiwan, tested positive. And in February, a case was reported in a non-L.A. County resident who arrived on a Korean Air flight from Seoul. 'The traveler was not infectious during the time of travel,' the county Department of Public Health said in a statement Friday regarding the most recent case. Officials are working to identify people who may have been exposed while the infected person was contagious with the virus. Symptoms of measles include a high fever — above 101 degrees — cough, runny nose, red and watery eyes and a rash, which usually starts on the face and spreads to the rest of the body. Measles spreads easily through the air and can remain airborne and on surfaces for hours, even after an infectious person has left the room. People can spread measles to others from four days before the disease's telltale rash appears through four days afterward, according to the CDC. People who have not been immunized against measles, either through vaccination or prior infection, are at risk of getting sick between seven and 21 days after exposure. Two doses of the measles vaccine are 97% effective against infection, health officials say. CDC officials have identified 10 measles outbreaks nationwide. The largest began in a close-knit community with low vaccination rates in Texas' Gaines County, adjacent to New Mexico. That outbreak has since spread to New Mexico and Oklahoma, and is suspected to be linked to more cases in Kansas, the CDC report said. A growing outbreak in the Mexican state of Chihuahua was also reported after a resident fell ill after visiting Gaines County. So far this year, 884 measles cases have been reported nationwide, 'the second-highest annual case count in 25 years,' according to the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. During all of 2024, 285 measles cases were reported nationally. Of the cases reported so far this year, the median patient age was 8. About one-third of those infected were younger than 5, the report said. Among all measles patients, 96% were not vaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. Nationally, 85 measles patients this year have had to be hospitalized. Except for one, all of them were either unvaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. Texas officials have said the cause of the state's latest measles death was measles pulmonary failure. Most of the measles cases reported so far nationally this year are tied to close-knit communities with low vaccination coverage, the CDC said. Before Friday's announcement, nine measles cases had been reported in California this year, with cases also reported in Orange, Riverside, Fresno, San Mateo, Placer and Tuolumne counties, according to the California Department of Public Health. In 2024, California confirmed 15 cases of measles. In 2023, the total was only four. California's worst measles outbreak in recent memory occurred between December 2014 and April 2015. Centered at Disneyland, the outbreak resulted in about 131 Californians getting infected. People from six other states, Mexico and Canada were also sickened, according to the California Department of Public Health. Following that outbreak, California lawmakers strengthened childhood vaccination requirements for schoolchildren. For the 2023-24 academic year, 96.2% of California's kindergartners were vaccinated against measles, mumps and rubella. That's slightly down from the 96.5% seen the year prior. But it remains above the levels recorded before the Disneyland measles outbreak, which were less than 94%. Public health experts say they aim for a 95% measles vaccination rate to guard against outbreaks. Amid the ongoing outbreaks, pediatricians have stepped up efforts to rebut misinformation about both the disease and the vaccine. 'The measles vaccine is safe and effective,' the American Academy of Pediatrics said in a recent statement, rebutting what they called 'wellness influencers and anti-vaccine advocates' who they say 'falsely assert' that getting vaccinated 'is as dangerous as contracting measles itself.' 'Extensive research demonstrates that the MMR vaccine is safe and significantly reduces the risk of contracting measles, a disease that can lead to severe complications and death,' the pediatrics group said.
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
The CDC says its tally of US measles cases is likely an undercount
The number of measles cases traced to the West Texas outbreak are likely undercounted, health officials say. Dr. David Sugerman, a senior scientist leading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention measles response, told a meeting of the centers' vaccine advisory committee that officials believe there's 'quite a large amount of cases that are not reported and underreported.' 'In working very closely with our colleagues in Texas; in talking with families, they may mention prior cases that have recovered and never received testing, other families that may have cases and never sought treatment,' he said Tuesday. Sugerman also noted that most of the nation's cases have been driven in undervaccinated communities like the Lone Star State's Gaines County. The county accounts for nearly 65 percent of the state's cases. The agency has deployed more than a dozen people to the state, and is sending more this week. 'This reallocation, or what Dr. Sugerman called scraping, is not unique to this outbreak or a direct result of current initiatives to restructure CDC. When outbreaks occur, the agency must reallocate resources from other programs to respond,' the CDC told The Independent on Thursday. Right now, the CDC reports that there are more than 700 cases across the U.S., although it only updates its tally once a week. In Texas, the state's health authorities said Tuesday that there were 561 cases confirmed there since January, as well as 58 hospitalizations over the course of the outbreak. Two unvaccinated children who lived in the outbreak area have died. Measles is prevented by getting doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine that provide decades-long immunity. But, convincing communities to get the vaccine or vaccinate their children has proven to be a major hurdle. Rising vaccine hesitancy has been reported across the nation. 'Parental vaccine hesitancy might be contributing to the low levels of influenza vaccination coverage, due to a higher degree of hesitancy among parents about influenza vaccine compared with other routine childhood vaccines,' researchers said last year in a study published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. While Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has endorsed getting the measles shots, he has also promoted some questionable alternative practices, claimed the vaccines were 'leaky' and said that the vaccines should not be mandated. Experts have warned that casting doubts on vaccines could come with deadly consequences and reverse years of medical progress – especially with measles' continued spread. Sugerman said coverage with the vaccine has been decreasing since the pandemic. 'It is often said that the first responsibility of any government is the safety and protection of its people,' the journal Nature's editorial board said. 'That alone should be reason enough for policymakers to encourage people to get themselves and their children vaccinated. Vaccines save lives, and casting doubt on their safety could have dangerous and far-reaching consequences.'
Yahoo
17-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
The CDC says its tally of US measles cases is likely an undercount
The number of measles cases traced to the West Texas outbreak are likely undercounted, health officials say. Dr. David Sugerman, a senior scientist leading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention measles response, told a meeting of the centers' vaccine advisory committee that officials believe there's 'quite a large amount of cases that are not reported and underreported.' 'In working very closely with our colleagues in Texas; in talking with families, they may mention prior cases that have recovered and never received testing, other families that may have cases and never sought treatment,' he said Tuesday. Sugerman also noted that most of the nation's cases have been driven in undervaccinated communities like the Lone Star State's Gaines County. The county accounts for nearly 65 percent of the state's cases. The agency has deployed more than a dozen people to the state, and is sending more this week. 'This reallocation, or what Dr. Sugerman called scraping, is not unique to this outbreak or a direct result of current initiatives to restructure CDC. When outbreaks occur, the agency must reallocate resources from other programs to respond,' the CDC told The Independent on Thursday. Right now, the CDC reports that there are more than 700 cases across the U.S., although it only updates its tally once a week. In Texas, the state's health authorities said Tuesday that there were 561 cases confirmed there since January, as well as 58 hospitalizations over the course of the outbreak. Two unvaccinated children who lived in the outbreak area have died. Measles is prevented by getting doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine that provide decades-long immunity. But, convincing communities to get the vaccine or vaccinate their children has proven to be a major hurdle. Rising vaccine hesitancy has been reported across the nation. 'Parental vaccine hesitancy might be contributing to the low levels of influenza vaccination coverage, due to a higher degree of hesitancy among parents about influenza vaccine compared with other routine childhood vaccines,' researchers said last year in a study published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. While Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has endorsed getting the measles shots, he has also promoted some questionable alternative practices, claimed the vaccines were 'leaky' and said that the vaccines should not be mandated. Experts have warned that casting doubts on vaccines could come with deadly consequences and reverse years of medical progress – especially with measles' continued spread. Sugerman said coverage with the vaccine has been decreasing since the pandemic. 'It is often said that the first responsibility of any government is the safety and protection of its people,' the journal Nature's editorial board said. 'That alone should be reason enough for policymakers to encourage people to get themselves and their children vaccinated. Vaccines save lives, and casting doubt on their safety could have dangerous and far-reaching consequences.'
The Independent
17-04-2025
- Health
- The Independent
The CDC says its tally of US measles cases is likely an undercount
The number of measles cases traced to the West Texas outbreak are likely undercounted, health officials say. Dr. David Sugerman, a senior scientist leading the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention measles response, told a meeting of the centers' vaccine advisory committee that officials believe there's 'quite a large amount of cases that are not reported and underreported.' 'In working very closely with our colleagues in Texas; in talking with families, they may mention prior cases that have recovered and never received testing, other families that may have cases and never sought treatment,' he said Tuesday. Sugerman also noted that most of the nation's cases have been driven in undervaccinated communities like the Lone Star State's Gaines County. The county accounts for nearly 65 percent of the state's cases. The agency has deployed more than a dozen people to the state, and is sending more this week. 'This reallocation, or what Dr. Sugerman called scraping, is not unique to this outbreak or a direct result of current initiatives to restructure CDC. When outbreaks occur, the agency must reallocate resources from other programs to respond,' the CDC told The Independent on Thursday. Right now, the CDC reports that there are more than 700 cases across the U.S., although it only updates its tally once a week. In Texas, the state's health authorities said Tuesday that there were 561 cases confirmed there since January, as well as 58 hospitalizations over the course of the outbreak. Two unvaccinated children who lived in the outbreak area have died. Measles is prevented by getting doses of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine that provide decades-long immunity. But, convincing communities to get the vaccine or vaccinate their children has proven to be a major hurdle. Rising vaccine hesitancy has been reported across the nation. 'Parental vaccine hesitancy might be contributing to the low levels of influenza vaccination coverage, due to a higher degree of hesitancy among parents about influenza vaccine compared with other routine childhood vaccines,' researchers said last year in a study published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. While Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has endorsed getting the measles shots, he has also promoted some questionable alternative practices, claimed the vaccines were 'leaky' and said that the vaccines should not be mandated. Experts have warned that casting doubts on vaccines could come with deadly consequences and reverse years of medical progress – especially with measles' continued spread. Sugerman said coverage with the vaccine has been decreasing since the pandemic. 'It is often said that the first responsibility of any government is the safety and protection of its people,' the journal Nature's editorial board said. 'That alone should be reason enough for policymakers to encourage people to get themselves and their children vaccinated. Vaccines save lives, and casting doubt on their safety could have dangerous and far-reaching consequences.'
