Children Are Back in School. Measles Is, Too

This fall in the U.S., as kids settle into a new school year, measles is spreading at a level not seen in 35 years. And in just the past month, 10 children have been infected in an outbreak linked to a single daycare in Georgia. Far too many students are entering classrooms vulnerable to a highly contagious and dangerous virus.

Yet there has been relative silence from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the agency where I once served as a senior leader, about measles. CDC’s back-to-school messages on X have advised families about sleep, physical activity, healthy lunches, and bullying.

But one message emphasized in prior years at the start of school is noticeably absent and can now be found only in CDC’s online archives: Get your child up to date on routine vaccinations. During the country’s largest measles resurgence in decades, that should be the nation’s most urgent back-to-school message. CDC’s reticence extends beyond social media.

Four measles-associated deaths reported by Pennsylvania were initially absent from the agency’s national dashboard. In late August, CDC posted two of the Pennsylvania deaths, then added an asterisk and language that it was reviewing additional information. The deaths were later removed without a clear explanation.

Now two deaths are reported on CDC’s dashboard as of September 28 without identifying the states. This is not transparency; it is silence at a moment when families need clear, accurate information to protect their children. Why are these deaths being left off the official tally?

There’s a disagreement between federal and state officials over how to count measles deaths—even though Pennsylvania investigated each death and reported them to CDC through the established nationally notifiable disease surveillance system that has been used by state and local health departments across the country for years. In late August, when officials from Pennsylvania announced the first two deaths there, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), even questioned if the deaths were fabricated.