Josh Shapiro’s announcement of two measles-associated deaths, fueling a growing clash with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the state’s outbreak swells to 460 confirmed cases across 31 counties. Joshua Parsons, one of three Lancaster County commissioners, accused Shapiro of being intentionally "deceptive" during a press conference earlier this week, when the Democratic governor pointed to two "measles-related deaths" in the county.
"Well, the governor, in the press conference, they said they were measles-associated deaths, but it was framed, and very much the underlying assertion to it, was that these were measles deaths," Parsons told Fox News Digital. During a Tuesday press conference alongside Dr. Debra Bogen at Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health Hospital, Shapiro announced the deaths of two people who were unvaccinated for measles.
"Today, we see the consequences of a lack of immunizations in the first measles-associated deaths that our Commonwealth has seen in 35 years," Shapiro said. FORMER CDC ADVISER SAYS DECLINE IN KINDERGARTEN VACCINATIONS NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT: 'KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON' Shapiro strongly urged Pennsylvanians to get vaccinated for measles during the press conference. "I want to be clear: This illness and death from measles is completely preventable," he said.
Parsons said Shapiro cast the deaths as being the result of measles. MEASLES DEATHS MAY HAVE BEEN 'FABRICATED,' RFK JR CLAIMS AFTER CORONER RAISES QUESTIONS Parsons noted that national media outlets framed the deaths as being from measles. The New York Times, in a Tuesday story still posted to its website, wrote the headline, "Two Unvaccinated People Died From Measles in Pennsylvania, Officials Say." However, according to conversations he had with the Lancaster County Coroner, Parsons claimed nobody in the county has died from measles this year.
"The coroner reported that they don't have… they had zero measles deaths or measles associated-deaths reported. And in Pennsylvania if you have someone who dies of a contagious disease, that does have to be reported to the county coroner," Parsons told Fox News Digital. Stephen Diamoantoni, has also publicly stated in interviews with local media that he had not been contacted by either Shapiro or the Pennsylvania Department of Health and was surprised to learn of the press conference.
"The coroner had one case where there was an infant who died in a home birth, and he's talked about this publicly, and that infant died with measles but not of measles. At the time of the press conference, the state did not indicate who these two cases were or anything about them. Subsequently, they came out and said that this infant is one of the ones they're counting," Parsons told Fox News Digital.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
