There have been at least 1,277 confirmed cases of measles reported in the U.S. in 2025, according to data from a Johns Hopkins University center.

AT 9:00. WE TURN TO FIVE ON YOUR HEALTH TONIGHT. AND MEASLES OUTBREAKS HERE IN THE UNITED STATES HITTING A NEW LEVEL. THE NUMBER OF NEW CASES IS NOW PASSING THE 1000 MARK. AND JOINING US RIGHT NOW IS DOCTOR TODD ELLERIN, CHIEF OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES AT SOUTH SHORE HEALTH. IT’S ALWAYS GREAT TO SEE YOU. HAPPY FRIDAY. SO LET’S START WITH THE CDC’S REPORT. AND WE’LL PUT THE DATA BACK UP ON THE SCREEN. 1001 CONFIRMED CASES OF THE MEASLES IN 30 STATES. NOT NOT ALL 50, BUT 30 STATES. AND THAT’S THE SECOND HIGHEST NUMBER OF INFECTIONS SINCE THE U.S. ELIMINATED MEASLES BACK IN 2000. AND WHAT IT’S ONLY THE MONTH OF MAY IS IS THE SITUATION OUT OF CONTROL? WHAT DO YOU THINK? WELL, LISTEN, IT’S NOT A GOOD SITUATION. EVEN WHEN YOU LOOK AT THE PAST FEW WEEKS, THERE’S BEEN ABOUT A 15% INCREASE IN WEST TEXAS, WEST TEXAS, WEST TEXAS HAS OVER 700 CASES. BUT THIS ISN’T JUST ABOUT TEXAS. WE’RE NOW SEEING SPREADS IN OTHER PLACES. ADJACENT STATES, EVEN EVEN IN THE WESTERN PART OF NORTH DAKOTA, WHERE THE VACCINATION RATES ARE SIGNIFICANTLY LOWER THAN THEY NEED TO BE. REMEMBER, WE NEED TO BE IN THE MID 90S TO REALLY GET CONTROL. WHERE ARE WE IN PARTS OF WEST TEXAS WHERE 80% OR BELOW IN, YOU KNOW, NORTH DAKOTA? THE SAME. IT’S JUST NOT HIGH ENOUGH. AND OKAY, GIVEN THAT THAT SITUATION SO FAR THE ONLY NEW ENGLAND STATES WITH MEASLES INFECTIONS ARE RHODE ISLAND AND VERMONT. HAS MASSACHUSETTS BEEN LUCKY OR IS WE DOING SOMETHING RIGHT HERE? WELL, NEW ENGLAND IS DOING REALLY WELL. THESE HAVE BEEN ISOLATED CASES, SINGLE CASES IN BOTH OF THOSE STATES. AND THEY WERE IN INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL. SO PROBABLY ACQUIRED INTERNATIONALLY. BUT THE BOTTOM LINE IS MASSACHUSETTS IS GOING TO SEE A CASE. THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS WE DON’T SEE SIGNIFICANT SPREAD AND YOU DON’T SEE SIGNIFICANT SPREAD WHEN YOUR PERCENTAGE OF IMMUNIZATION IS IN THE 90%. AND WE ARE IN MASSACHUSETTS ON AVERAGE, I THINK 92, 93%. SO SO OBVIOUSLY WE’RE GETTING CLOSE TO SUMMER MEMORIAL DAY. THE UNOFFICIAL START OF SUMMER IS RIGHT AROUND THE CORNER. SO FOR A LOT OF FAMILIES, THAT MEANS THE START OF VACATIONS. THE START OF SUMMER CAMP. SO WHAT’S THE RISK OF A MEASLES OUTBREAK AFFECTING THOSE PLANS? I’M GLAD YOU ASKED THAT. IN THE PAST, REMEMBER, WE SOMETIMES FORGET MEASLES IS A RESPIRATORY VIRUS, AND OFTENTIMES IN THE PAST, WHAT IS HALTED. THE SPREAD IS SPRING AND SUMMER. SO THE QUESTION IS RIGHT NOW, WHAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN IN THE SUMMER IN PLACES WHERE THERE’S OUTBREAKS? SO I THINK THE THE KEY IS ANYTIME YOU’RE GOING INTO A PLACE THAT’S GOING TO HAVE A CONGREGATE SETTING LIKE SUMMER CAMP, IT’S LIKE SCHOOLS, RIGHT? YOU WANT TO MAKE SURE YOUR KIDS ARE VACCINATED. REMEMBER, IN THE U.S. RIGHT NOW, WHEN YOU THINK ABOUT THOSE THOUSAND CASES, 96% OF THEM WERE NOT VACCINATED OR UNKNOWN, 96%. ONLY 2% HAD A SINGLE DOSE OF MMR VACCINE, AND ONLY 2% HAD BOTH DOSES. SO IT IS AN EXCELLENT VACCINE. I WANT PEOPLE TO UNDERSTAND FROM MY PERSPECTIVE, THE BENEFITS FAR OUTWEIGH THE RISKS, BUT I KNOW THERE’S A LOT OF MISTRUST, WHICH MAKES IT DIFFICULT.

Advertisement Measles cases surge to record high since disease was declared eliminated in the US There have been at least 1,277 confirmed cases of measles reported in the U.S. in 2025, according to data from a Johns Hopkins University center. Editorial Standards ⓘ

Falling childhood vaccine coverage and a large, smoldering outbreak that was kindled in an undervaccinated pocket of West Texas have driven the United States to a troubling new milestone: There have been more measles cases in the U.S. this year than any other since the disease was declared eliminated a quarter-century ago.Video above: Doctor on the measles outbreak and vaccinesThere have been at least 1,277 confirmed cases of measles reported in the U.S. in 2025, according to data from the Johns Hopkins University Center for Outbreak Response Innovation. Just halfway through the year, the case tally has already surpassed the last record from 2019, when there were a total of 1,274 cases.Experts say this year’s cases are likely to be severely undercounted because many are going unreported. Three people have died from measles this year – two children in Texas and one adult in New Mexico, all of whom were unvaccinated – matching the total number of U.S. measles deaths from the previous two and a half decades.Measles was declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, meaning there has not been continuous transmission for more than a year at a time. Reaching this status was “a historic public health achievement,” according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, possible in large part because of vaccine development. The measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine that is most commonly used first became widely available in the U.S. in the 1970s.Before this year, there have been an average of about 180 measles cases reported each year since the disease was declared eliminated, according to CDC data.In 2019, large outbreaks in New York threatened elimination status; those outbreaks were concentrated in Orthodox Jewish communities in Brooklyn and Rockland County that had been targeted with anti-vaccine disinformation for years.This year, the vast majority of measles cases have been in Texas, with more than 750 confirmed cases associated with one outbreak that started in late January. If cases associated with that outbreak continue to accumulate through January of next year, the U.S. could lose its measles elimination status.Most of those cases – more than 400 since the start of the year – have been in Gaines County, according to the state health department, where vaccination rates are well below the recommended level. In the 2024-25 school year, nearly 1 in 4 kindergartners in Gaines County did not have their required MMR vaccine, one of the worst rates in the state.Dozens of cases in New Mexico and Oklahoma have also been linked to the West Texas outbreak, and cases reported in Kansas may also be connected.Special vaccination clinics that have been stood up in response to the outbreak have led to additional coverage for thousands of people. Many of the affected counties have also introduced expanded vaccination guidance, allowing infants to get their first shot as early as 6 months old instead of waiting until 1 year. In New Mexico, nearly twice as many MMR vaccines have been administered this year than there were at this point last year, according to data from the state health department.And a recent analysis of health records by Truveta, a health care data and analytics company, shows that early vaccination rates jumped among infants in Texas. MMR vaccination rates among 6-month-olds in Texas this year are more than eight times higher than they were in 2019, and in March and April, about 1 in 5 children who received their first measles shot in Texas had gotten it early, before their first birthday.But as the pace of new cases associated with the West Texas outbreak has slowed, cases have continued to accumulate across the country. There have been at least 27 total outbreaks – defined as three or more related cases – and at least 38 states have reported at least one case this year.Cases rose quickly in Colorado last month when an out-of-state traveler flew while infectious, leading to multiple cases among passengers on the same plane, and others among people who were in the airport at the same time and broader community spread from those cases.Other cases among Colorado residents were linked to travel to Chihuahua, Mexico, where there is also a large outbreak concentrated among the local Mennonite population. There is another large outbreak happening in Ontario, Canada, which was linked to multiple cases in Michigan. At least one person has died from measles this year in Canada, and there have been nine deaths in Mexico.In April, Mexico issued a warning for people traveling to the U.S. and Canada due to high measles case rates. The CDC has also stepped up its guidance for travelers, advising that anyone traveling internationally should be vaccinated with two doses of the MMR vaccine.Most cases are in unvaccinated peopleThe vast majority of cases in the U.S. this year have been in people who are unvaccinated; only about 8% of confirmed cases have been in people who had received one or two doses of the MMR vaccine, according to the CDC. At least 155 people with measles – about 1 out of every 8 cases – have been hospitalized this year, CDC data shows, and 28% of cases have been in children younger than 5.The MMR vaccine is safe and extremely effective – one dose is 93% effective against measles, and two doses are 97% effective – but measles is one of the most highly transmissible diseases in the world.The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has set a goal that at least 95% of children in kindergarten will have gotten two doses of the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine, a threshold necessary to help prevent outbreaks of the highly contagious disease. The U.S. has now fallen short of that threshold for four years in a row.A record share of U.S. kindergartners had an exemption for required vaccinations in the 2023-24 school year, leaving more than 125,000 new schoolchildren without coverage for at least one state-mandated vaccine, according to data published by the CDC in October.When the measles case count reached its previous record in 2019 – under the first Trump administration – both the HHS secretary and CDC director at the time released statements emphasizing the safety and effectiveness of the MMR vaccine and encouraging Americans to get vaccinated.However, the CDC still does not have a director, and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has a long and complicated history with measles vaccines.In April, when there had been about 600 measles cases in the U.S., Kennedy made his strongest endorsement of vaccination yet – but it stood in stark contrast to years of work against measles vaccines. And last month, Kennedy dismissed an expert panel of vaccine advisers that has historically guided the federal government’s vaccine recommendations, a move that concerned public health officials across the country.“With an ongoing measles outbreak and routine child vaccination rates declining, this move will further fuel the spread of vaccine-preventable illnesses,” Dr. Bruce A. Scott, president of the American Medical Association, said in a statement at the time.

Every state has laws that require children to get certain vaccines before they can go to school or daycare. Yet parents may be able to opt out of one or more vaccines for medical, religious, or personal reasons.

Vaccine exemption laws vary from state to state. Some states make it easier to avoid vaccines than others.

Statistics show that states where exemptions are easy to get have more unvaccinated kids than states that make the process harder. Kids who don’t get vaccinated are more likely to get sick. High exemption rates have been linked to outbreaks of diseases like measles, mumps, and pertussis (whooping cough).

The first part of 2025 was among the worst in decades. As of April that year, a total of 884 confirmed measles cases and three measles-related deaths were reported by 30 states. Compare that to 2024, with a total of 285 cases (in 33 states) and no deaths reported. In 2024, there were 35,000-plus cases of pertussis reported — and 10 deaths — compared to 7,000 cases and 7 deaths in 2024.

These and other recent disease outbreaks have led some states to consider passing stricter vaccine exemption laws, while others, such as Arizona, have moved to loosen restrictions.

LOADING ERROR LOADING

The bulk of measles cases have been in Texas, but states including New Jersey, New York, Washington, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Ohio have also reported cases.

Advertisement

It’s natural to be scared of this highly contagious virus, which in rare cases can cause death and severe illness, but not everyone has to have the same level of worry. (Yes, vaccination is key for your safety.)

Below, doctors share who should be worried and what you should know if there’s a measles case in your area.

If you’re sure that you’re fully vaccinated against measles, you don’t have much to worry about.

People who are fully vaccinated against measles can breathe a sigh of relief; you likely are safe from any serious complications from measles even if you do get infected.

Advertisement

“It’s generally cited that the measles vaccine, assuming you’ve received two doses of the current MMR vaccine, current meaning since around 1969, is about 97% effective in preventing measles. So the vast majority of people have really little or nothing to be concerned about,” said Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes, the chief of the division of infectious diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

If a vaccinated person does get infected with measles, “The chance of that infection going on to have some kind of meaningful or clinically significant bad outcome is quite low,” said Dr. Neil Gandhi, an emergency medicine physician at Houston Methodist Hospital.

“People, to the extent that they’re able, should try to verify their vaccine history,” said Kuritzkes.

Advertisement

But since most school districts required proof of measles vaccination to start school until the last few years and since nearly all children born between roughly in 1969 until the last few years have been vaccinated, “It’s generally safe to assume that if you grew up in the United States and are under 60 years of age, that you have been been appropriately vaccinated,” noted Kuritzkes. (That is unless you know that your family didn’t get you vaccinated.)

If you were born before 1962 or 1963, you also likely don’t have to worry.

Before the measles vaccine was developed, most people got measles. Meaning, those who were born before the measles vaccine was developed in 1963 are thought to have lifelong immunity from natural infection, said Kuritzkes.

So, if you are old enough to have had measles, you don’t need to be concerned about exposure now, he said.

Advertisement

People who were vaccinated before 1969 may need to consider getting an additional booster.

According to Kuritzkes, “There is this small group of people who were vaccinated [before] 1969 with a killed measles vaccine that is less effective than the live measles vaccine” that is now used in the MMR shot.

This isn’t a huge group of people, it’s estimated to be about 1 million Americans, he said.

“Those individuals should receive a measles booster with the current MMR if they have not already received that at some point during their adulthood,” Kuritzkes added.

Thomas Barwick via Getty Images Vaccinated people don’t need to worry about measles, but there are additional precautions for immunocompromised folks, unvaccinated adults and babies.

Advertisement

If you aren’t sure of your vaccine history, you have a few choices.

It’s a scary time to not be sure if you’re fully vaccinated against measles, but there are a couple of things you can do, according to Dr. Michael Angarone, an associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago.

First, you can ask your doctor to run a blood test to see if you have antibodies to measles, he said. If you do have antibodies, that means you’re protected. If you don’t, you can set up an appointment for your shot.

If you can’t get the blood test, “The other option is to just get vaccinated. There is not harm in getting an extra dose of the MMR vaccine as an adult,” Angarone noted.

Advertisement

While the vaccine is generally given at 12 months, babies can be vaccinated early in certain situations.

Many people are rightfully concerned about infants as measles cases continue to crop up. “Babies who are under the age of 12-months-old, they’re definitely at a risk for some measles complication if they’re exposed to someone,” said Gandhi.

Typically, babies are eligible for the first dose of the vaccine between 12 months and 15 months, but can get it earlier in certain situations.

Advertisement

“Children can receive it as early as 6 months,” said Kuritzkes, “and so I think it depends a bit on individual circumstances. Certainly, if you were living in Texas or New Mexico, I would be thinking about vaccinating infants at 6 months of age because of how widespread the current outbreak is.”

“If you’re elsewhere in the country, it depends on what’s happening in your community, and if you’re planning to travel,” Kuritzkes said. It’s often recommended that parents traveling with infants get them vaccinated before travel (so long as they’re at least 6 months old).

If your child is under 6 months and unable to get the shot, make sure the people who are around your child are vaccinated against measles, Angarone noted. And, if there’s an outbreak in your immediate area, consider keeping them home until the outbreak dissipates.

Advertisement

If you can’t get the MMR vaccine because you’re immunocompromised or pregnant, you need to take precautions.

“For most people who are immunosuppressed, so people who are not on active chemotherapy or are not on high doses of steroids … most of them we treat as if their immune system is working properly,” said Angarone.

“And so that’s where I think it becomes important for those individuals to really reach out to their health care providers,” Angarone added. This way, your doctor can help decipher if you can get the measles vaccine and how best to protect yourself.

Advertisement

“If you get exposed, measles virus is one of the, if not THE most contagious infectious diseases that we see, and so if you’re exposed, there’s not a lot we can do to prevent that infection from developing.” – Dr. Michael Angarone

“The group that we’re very mindful of are individuals that have more severe immunocompromised states,” he said, which includes those who have had an organ transplant, a stem cell transplant, have advanced HIV, are receiving chemotherapy, are on high-doses of steroid medication or have a hereditary immune compromised condition.

The MMR vaccine is not recommended to people in these groups because “the vaccine is a live virus vaccine, and we worry about the potential adverse reactions to that live vaccine in someone who has a severe immune compromising condition,” said Angarone.

Advertisement

So, unless there is a very large outbreak or there has been a thorough conversation with a doctor, it’s not recommended for these folks to get the jab.

This is also true for pregnant people as the live vaccine can put the fetus at risk, he said.

So, what are unvaccinated people in these groups supposed to do? “What I would say is, in that group of people, everyone that’s around those individuals, partners, spouses, children, family, parents, friends, co-workers, should be vaccinated and can get vaccinated,” added Angarone.

If you’re not vaccinated and are able to get the shot, you should get vaccinated.

If you can get the MMR vaccine but don’t have it, you should get vaccinated, all three experts told HuffPost.

Advertisement

“And you need to receive two vaccinations to be fully immune, and those vaccines need to be administered at least a month apart,” said Kuritzkes.

Vaccination is the way to prevent measles, added Angarone — not vitamin A or cod liver oil or any of the other at-home remedies that are gaining popularity.

“If you can’t, if you fall into one of those high-risk groups where the measles vaccine is contraindicated, or you’re just not willing to get vaccinated, you have to be mindful of, ‘Am I developing symptoms of measles?’” Angarone noted.

Advertisement

“If you get exposed, measles virus is one of the, if not the most contagious infectious diseases that we see, and so if you’re exposed, there’s not a lot we can do to prevent that infection from developing,” said Angarone.

If you are exposed to the virus, you should monitor for symptoms, which include a high fever, cough, watery red eyes, runny nose, and a rash that starts on the head and face and moves down to the rest of the body, according to Angarone.

“If you have any of those after exposure, you want to make sure you isolate yourself so that you’re not exposing anyone,” Angarone noted, and added that you’ll also want to reach out to your doctor who can give guidance in regard to monitoring your symptoms and symptom management.

Advertisement

“We really get concerned about the late-stage symptoms — patients who get significant high fever … swelling of the brain and other organs, that’s a big concern, and patients who can really only get that will be the unvaccinated,” Gandhi added.

“Fortunately, the chance of having a severe infection, even if you’re unvaccinated, is quite low,” said Gandhi.

20 Years Of Free Journalism Your Support Fuels Our Mission Your Support Fuels Our Mission For two decades, HuffPost has been fearless, unflinching, and relentless in pursuit of the truth. Support our mission to keep us around for the next 20 — we can’t do this without you. We remain committed to providing you with the unflinching, fact-based journalism everyone deserves. Thank you again for your support along the way. We’re truly grateful for readers like you! Your initial support helped get us here and bolstered our newsroom, which kept us strong during uncertain times. Now as we continue, we need your help more than ever. We hope you will join us once again. We remain committed to providing you with the unflinching, fact-based journalism everyone deserves. Thank you again for your support along the way. We’re truly grateful for readers like you! Your initial support helped get us here and bolstered our newsroom, which kept us strong during uncertain times. Now as we continue, we need your help more than ever. We hope you will join us once again. Support HuffPost Already contributed? Log in to hide these messages.

A low chance of severe symptoms doesn’t mean you should ignore the risk, though. “Even if serious effects are rare, do you really want to roll the dice to have your child or your loved one be the one that is that 1%? I don’t,” said Angarone.

Advertisement

Politics / Trump’s Legacy Will Be the Countless People Killed by His Policies Millions across the world could die because of the choices Trump has made in his first 100 days.

Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in the Oval Office on April 18, 2025. (Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)

The first 100 days of Donald Trump’s second administration ended this week. Many, including me, have written about the devastation these few months have caused to important programs across the federal government, and the ways that science and public health have been undermined in both word and deed.

These attacks have not gone unanswered. There has been a flurry of lawsuits to stop the cuts at NIH, NSF, CDC, and other agencies. Universities are standing up to the administration, and thousands are organizing to defend America’s health and the health of people around the globe. But the wreckage is still vast.

As the scope of the damage the president has done becomes clear, scientists are also starting to document and estimate the toll of death and suffering that will now be a part of Trump’s legacy. Several new papers have underscored what is at stake.

In a paper in one of The Lancet’s family of journals, Jan Hontelez, from Erasmus University Medical College in Rotterdam, and colleagues from around the world estimated the short-term effects of a 90-day interruption in funding for the US’s flagship global HIV/AIDS program, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Three months might not seem like a long time, but it’s enough to cause tremendous harm. The excess deaths the study predicts under various scenarios in seven sub-Saharan African countries range from 64,000 to 70,000 over the next five years. Given that most PEPFAR sites are now in limbo, we will soon be able to put these predictions to the test.

Longer-term estimates of the effects of the cessation of PEPFAR funding are even more grim. Debra ten Brink at the Burnet Institute in Australia and colleagues in The Lancet HIV suggest that anticipated international aid reductions, including the cessation of PEPFAR funding, may lead to 4.4 million to 10.8 million additional new HIV infections by 2030 and between 770,000 to 2.9 million HIV-related deaths in children and adults by 2030.

These estimates are for HIV only. The impact on tuberculosis, malaria, and other health conditions is similarly grisly. Mathematical modeler Brooke Nichols from Boston University has estimates for these additional effects of Trump’s policies at impactcounter.com.

When masked men carrying automatic weapons won’t identify themselves or offer a warrant then take someone from his Great Barrington apartment in broad daylight, it is hard to know what is legal these days. So I wonder, if a government official enacts policies that result in the deaths of Americans, has he killed them? I don’t really know, but let’s assume he has.

I had just begun working on this column when I read that Judge Beryl Howell had issued his 102-page opinion in Perkins Coie LLP v. Department of Justice, a case challenging Donald Trump’s attempt to destroy a law firm he had come to hate.

I was quite proud that I had enlisted the aid of William Shakespeare when I discovered Howell had had the same idea and had done it better. Justice that he is, Howell brings the law not just the lawyers into it. Howell writes:

No American President has ever before issued executive orders like the one at issue in this lawsuit targeting a prominent law firm with adverse actions to be executed by all Executive branch agencies but, in purpose and effect, this action draws from a playbook as old as Shakespeare, who penned the phrase: ‘The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.’ WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, HENRY VI, PART 2, act 4, sc. 2, l. 75.

When Shakespeare’s character, a rebel leader intent on becoming king, see id. l. 74, hears this suggestion, he promptly incorporates this tactic as part of his plan to assume power, leading in the same scene to the rebel leader demanding ‘[a]way with him,’ referring to an educated clerk, who ‘can make obligations and write court hand,’ id. l. 90, 106. Eliminating lawyers as the guardians of the rule of law removes a major impediment to the path to more power. See Walters v. Nat’l Ass’n of Radiation Survivors, 473 U.S. 305, 371 n.24 (1985) (Stevens, J., dissenting) (explaining the import of the same Shakespearean statement to be ‘that disposing of lawyers is a step in the direction of a totalitarian form of government’).

Howell powerfully makes his point that lawyers can serve a critical role as an impediment to authoritarianism—pretty obvious these days as lawyers represent federal workers unfairly fired and immigrants illegally deported. But I, unfortunately, am dealing here with a lawyer who serves not as an opponent but as an agent of authoritarianism. And I have turned to the Bard for help in the indictment.

I think it is fair to say the world’s best writer wasn’t terribly fond of lawyers. Shakespeare’s Mercutio in “Romeo and Juliet” said this of the dream-weaving Queen Mab, the faeries’ mid-wife:

And in this state she gallops night by night

Through lovers’ brains, and then they dream of love;

O’er courtiers’ knees, that dream on court’sies straight,

O’er lawyers’ fingers, who straight dream on fees,

O’er ladies ‘ lips, who straight on kisses dream.

[Emphasis added.]

And Robert F. Kennedy, our current head of Truskmumpia’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), certainly made a fortune from his ties with Wisner Baum, a Los Angeles personal injury law firm.

In “Timon of Athens,” Shakespeare refers to the lawyer’s verbal quibbles, his quillets: “Crack the lawyer’s voice, That he may never more false title plead, Nor sound his quillets shrilly.”

In “Measure for Measure,” Angelo says: “The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.”

And most famous of all, as Judge Howell reminds us, Jack the Butcher, confederate of rebellious Jack Cade announces in “Henry IV Part II”: “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”

Well, irony of ironies, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. turns out to be more the executioner than the victim, the killer not the killed. Yes, this lawyer, while busy transforming HHS from an agency designed to protect us from disease to one actively hostile to the vaccines that best protect us, may very well, because of that hostility, be responsible for killing many of us, including our very vulnerable American children.

You might be thinking my title, “The lawyer who kills,” is beyond the pale, far too harsh, and undeserved. Yes, words matter. So what do you call someone who fires between 62,000 and 82,000 people who once actively searched for cures? What do you call someone who fires those who work hard to ensure little babies don’t needlessly die in their cribs from SIDS? What do you call someone who is trying to make it more difficult to get COVID vaccines that help to keep us out of the intensive care unit? Someone who doesn’t do everything in his power to convince people to take the measles, flu, and COVID shots that will keep them and their children alive?

Vaccines save lives—millions and millions of lives. But by repeatedly and systematically casting doubt on their effectiveness—even going so far as to suggest that some vaccines are more dangerous than the diseases they are meant to prevent—Robert F. Kennedy Jr. clearly risks lives and encourages death.

When I last wrote about measles, there were 476 cases spread across three states: Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Kansas. You may remember that Kennedy’s response was to half-heartedly acknowledge the effectiveness of immunization but simultaneously, even enthusiastically, advocate for an alternative treatment regime of aerosolized budensonide and clarithromycin.

On May 4, 2025, Katelin Jetelina, Your Local Epidemiologist, wrote:

the U.S. had 967 confirmed cases. We are getting closer and closer to reaching the record high (1,200) since we eliminated measles in 2000. Of that, 817 cases are from the Southwest outbreak. The good news is that it may be slowing down in West Texas … Transmission continues, just at a slower pace … Other sporadic cases continue to pop up in the past week. Also, a small outbreak in Montana continues to grow, and a new outbreak in North Dakota …

It is fair to credit Robert F. Kennedy Jr. with provoking much of the skepticism Americans bring to the issue of immunization. This quote comes from a February 2021 discussion sponsored by Children’s Health Defense, the organization that employed him:

Misinformation and more misinformation.

Here is a January 8, 2025, report from The Washington Post:

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee for the nation’s top health post, has repeatedly disparaged vaccines, falsely linked them to autism … In at least 36 appearances, Kennedy linked autism to vaccines, despite overwhelming scientific evidence supporting the use of vaccination to protect people from deadly infectious diseases and refuting any ties to autism, The Post found in a review of more than 400 of Kennedy’s podcast appearances, interviews and public speeches since 2020. Long considered among the greatest public health achievements of the 20th century, vaccines have beat back infectious diseases including polio and measles and saved more than 150 million lives around the world, according to the World Health Organization. But a Gallup poll shows Americans have become less likely since 2019 to say it is important to have their children vaccinated, a decline that came against the backdrop of concerns about coronavirus vaccine mandates.

A dozen vaccine experts, physicians and public health leaders said they were alarmed that someone who could shape vaccine policy as health and human services secretary failed to recognize reams of scientific data showing vaccines are safe and effective.

Like Donald Trump, RFK Jr. doesn’t lack for arrogance and grandiosity. The Post recalls this claim:

‘I’d actually like to see an example of something I’ve ever said on my Instagram, on the Children’s Health Defense, in my book, that’s not true. My book has 2,200 footnotes. I am an expert on vaccines. I’m not a doctor, but I can claim expertise because I have three best-selling books on vaccines,’ Kennedy said in an interview in April with KLCS, a California PBS station.

[Emphasis added.]

But the Post points out:

Several of the studies Kennedy points to in his public comments do not conclude what he says they do — or have been retracted. Georges C. Benjamin, a physician who leads the American Public Health Association, said that’s part of a larger pattern for Kennedy. ‘He continually takes information that may be factual in one situation with a bunch of caveats and makes bad correlations with it,’ Benjamin said.

As he systematically disassembles our public health system, one can only wonder how long Kennedy will tolerate being contradicted by this crystal-clear declaration on the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website:

Read it while you can. Because Robert F. Kennedy is marshalling his energies and empowering his fellow vaccine skeptics to revisit the entire issue of vaccines, revising our policy regarding vaccination, all to make it more difficult for us to protect ourselves. The Washington Post reported on March 10, 2025:

The Post reports:

The National Institutes of Health will cancel or cut back dozens of grants for research on why some people are reluctant to be vaccinated and how to increase acceptance of vaccines, according to an internal email obtained by The Washington Post on Monday.

The email, titled ‘required terminations — 3/10/25,’ shows that on Monday morning, the agency ‘received a new list … of awards that need to be terminated, today. It has been determined they do not align with NIH funding priorities related to vaccine hesitancy and/or uptake.’ … Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, another part of HHS, was asked by the Trump administration to launch a study into a possible connection between vaccines and autism, despite repeated research that shows no link between the two.

[Emphasis added.]

Given the dangers of measles, bird flu, and the continuing threats of COVID and influenza, this is a dreadful time to be cutting down on efforts to inform the public about the dangers of viral epidemics. In fact, the Kaiser Family Foundation has recently published new poll results about vaccine misinformation. They warn:

As the U.S. faces rising measles cases across multiple states and the highest number of cases since 2019, the latest KFF Tracking Poll on Health Information and Trust finds that most adults – including most parents – say they have heard at least one of several false claims about measles or the vaccine used to prevent it. About six in ten adults (63%) and a similar share of parents (61%) say they have read or heard the false claim that the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccines have been proven to cause autism in children and one in five adults and similar shares of parents (17%) have heard the false claim that vitamin A can prevent measles infections. One in three adults (33%) say they have heard or read the false claim that the measles vaccines are more dangerous than being infected with measles, an increase of 15 percentage points from March 2024.

[Emphasis added.]

I think it is fair to say Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Children’s Health Defense deserve a lot of credit for the fact that so many Americans have been convinced by their lies. The following results show how pervasive the misperceptions about measles and the MMR vaccine are:

It is this growing tide of disinformation that propels the disturbing predictions of several researchers at Stanford Medical.

Katia Savchuk writes:

Diseases such as measles, rubella and polio could become endemic to the U.S. again if vaccine rates decline, according to modeling run by researchers at Stanford Medicine and their colleagues. Childhood vaccination rates have been falling in the United States, especially since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lower levels of immunity have resulted in a resurgence of measles cases, including a recent outbreak in western Texas that infected more than 620 people, leading to 64 hospitalizations and the deaths of two children.

If immunization rates drop further over a prolonged period of time, measles and even other wiped-out diseases — such as rubella and polio — could one day make a comeback in the United States, according to a new study by researchers at Stanford Medicine and other universities. The study, which was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association on April 24, used large-scale epidemiological modeling to simulate the spread of infectious diseases in the United States at various childhood vaccination levels. Even at current immunization rates, researchers predict that measles may become endemic again — circulating in the U.S. — within two decades; with small declines in vaccination, this could happen more quickly. However, small increases in vaccine coverage would prevent this.

[Emphasis added.]

Senior author Nathan Lo, M.D., Ph.D., assistant professor of infectious diseases, pointed out the reality that Kennedy fails to adequately acknowledge:

Measles is one of the most infectious diseases that exists, so the number of people who have to be immune to prevent it from spreading is extremely high. Polio, diphtheria and rubella are still far more infectious than COVID-19, for example, but measles is in a different ballpark, with one person infecting up to 20 others (though our model took a conservative estimate of 12) in a fully susceptible population. Also, the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine has become particularly controversial, partly due to a history of fraudulent medical research that raised safety concerns; it has been conclusively shown that there is no link with autism. Measles is also more common around the world, so travelers are more likely to bring it back.

Given this reality, Kennedy’s behavior is even more irresponsible. Here is his post on X following a visit to the funeral of one of the victims of the Texas measles outbreak:

Suggesting that measles can be successfully treated—and treated with steroids and clarithromycin—is malpractice. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) explains in “Fact Checked: Budesonide and Clarithromycin: Unproven and Risky”:

Key Facts:

There is no tested, valid treatment for measles. Children may need supportive care, once infected, such as assisting with breathing or hydration, as necessary. The only way to prevent measles is to equip our immune systems with the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine so our bodies can recognize and resist the disease. While most children recover from measles, some develop serious complications like pneumonia and brain swelling; about 1 child in every 1,000 will die after catching measles. There is no scientific evidence that inhaled steroids like budesonide or oral antibiotics like clarithromycin are beneficial for treating measles. Promoting medications to treat measles, particularly when those medications are not recommended, suggests that measles is treatable, which it is not. The most important way to combat measles is through prevention with the MMR vaccine. Clarithromycin is an antibiotic that is used to treat bacterial infections. Antibiotics kill bacteria, not viruses, so they don’t work against measles, which is a virus. Measles can weaken the body so much that patients develop bacterial infections. But experts do not recommend clarithromycin as a first-line treatment for bacterial infections caused by measles. Clarithromycin is a broad-spectrum antibiotic that targets a wide range of bacteria. Targeting everything, rather than specific bacteria, risks increasing resistance to antibiotics. Budesonide is an inhaled steroid generally used for asthma and is also not a recommended nor effective treatment for measles. Steroids should not be given early in an infection like measles because they interfere with the immune system, which is fighting measles for you. The MMR vaccine has been thoroughly tested and has been administered safely to millions and millions of children for more than 50 years.

AAP emphasizes, “It’s misleading and dangerous to promote the idea that measles is easily treated using unproven and ineffective therapies like budesonide and clarithromycin.”

For some children, the stakes are life and death. For years, Kennedy railed against the childhood MMR vaccine, then more recently attacking Dr. Fauci and working to curtail the COVID vaccines:

Now with power and authority, Kennedy is demanding a renewed study of possible links between autism and vaccines. The Washington Post reports:

President Donald Trump and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy have repeatedly linked vaccines to autism … Trump, who mentioned the rising rates of autism in his address to Congress this week, also has linked vaccines to autism. In a 2012 call into ‘Fox & Friends,’ he said ‘they go in, they get this monster shot — you ever see the size of it? It’s like they’re pumping in, you know it’s terrible, the amount, and they pump this into this little body, and then all of a sudden the child is different a month later. And I strongly believe that’s it.’

Truskmumpia’s version of the scientific method: the strong belief of someone who knows nothing about medicine and disease. Back to the Post:

In a statement, HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon said: ‘As President Trump said in his Joint Address to Congress, the rate of autism in American children has skyrocketed. CDC will leave no stone unturned in its mission to figure out what exactly is happening. The American people expect high quality research and transparency and that is what CDC is delivering.’

The debunked theory linking the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccines to autism traces to a 1998 study that was ultimately retracted. Study author Andrew Wakefield was barred from practicing medicine in Britain and found guilty of professional misconduct …

And so, which objective scientist will oversee this new study?

The Post reports:

A vaccine skeptic who has long promoted false claims about the connection between immunizations and autism has been tapped by the federal government to conduct a critical study of possible links between the two, according to current and former federal health officials. The Department of Health and Human Services has hired David Geier to conduct the analysis, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. Geier and his father, Mark Geier, have published papers claiming vaccines increase the risk of autism, a theory that has been studied for decades and scientifically debunked.

David Geier was disciplined by Maryland regulators more than a decade ago for practicing medicine without a license. He is listed as a data analyst in the HHS employee directory.

Public health and autism experts fear that choosing a researcher who has promoted false claims will produce a flawed study with far-reaching consequences. They fear it will undermine the importance of the lifesaving inoculations and further damage trust in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

David Geier, like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is fixated on a possible link between autism and the preservative thimerosol once found in vaccines. In Geier’s study “The relationship between mercury and autism: A comprehensive review and discussion,” a review of the work of others, he writes:

recent studies … have found that certain brain auto-antibodies correlate with mercury levels in children with ASD … This finding is biologically plausible since studies show that mercury exposure, especially to the mercury-based compound Thimerosal, can cause autoimmune dysfunction.

For example, Voldani et al. … conducted a study that demonstrated certain dietary peptides, bacterial toxins, and xenobiotics, such as Thimerosal, can bind to lymphocyte receptors and/or tissue enzymes, resulting in autoimmune reaction in children with autism. Havarinasab et al… also found that Thimerosal can induce (in genetically susceptible mice) a systemic autoimmune syndrome. In a recent study, Mostafa et al. … found a significant and positive linear relationship between levels of serum neurokinin A (a pro-inflammatory neuropeptide) and blood mercury levels in children with moderate and severe ASD, but not in healthy control children. They found that 78.3 % of the children with ASD with increased serum levels of neurokinin A had elevated blood mercury levels.

[Emphasis added.]

In a 2010 article, “Thimerosal-Containing Vaccines and Autism: A Review of Recent Epidemiologic Studies,” M. Hurley et al. highlight a 2008 study by Michael E. Pichichero designed “to assess blood levels and elimination of ethyl mercury after vaccination of infants with thimerosal-containing vaccines.” Hurley notes:

They studied 216 patients: 72 newborns, 72 infants aged 2 months, and 72 infants aged 6 months. The half-life of ethylmercury derived from thimerosal in vaccines that were injected intramuscularly into infants was much shorter than that of methylmercury in adults. The half-life of ethylmercury in blood was estimated to be 3.7 days and did not vary significantly by age group. Mercury levels in blood before vaccination were similar in 2-month-old and 6-month-old infants; this similarity suggests that ethylmercury does not accumulate in blood. The levels of mercury found in the stool suggest that the gastrointestinal system is involved in the elimination of ethylmercury.

Hurley concludes:

Epidemiologic studies continue to provide evidence that there is no association between thimerosal exposure and autism … Children should receive recommended immunizations to prevent serious disease. The known risks of serious complications from preventable infections—e.g., influenza—outweigh the risks of adverse consequences from vaccines …

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health published this report recently: “Vaccines Don’t Cause Autism. Why Do Some People Think They Do? How a retracted study from the 1990s undermined trust in vaccines and led to a persistent myth.” They add more context to the 1998 Dr. Andrew Wakefield paper cited by The Washington Post. Wakefield claimed that of 12 children who received the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine (MMR), eight later developed autism.

Bloomberg writes:

Wakefield got a lot of press and told people that he had shown vaccines had caused autism, which again, that study couldn’t even do. The paper was ultimately retracted. Within a short amount of time, several of the authors pulled their names … For example, the cases were not consecutive [i.e., they did not include all of the children studied. They were cherry-picked cases. And we know that, given that the age when children receive the MMR is also the age when some children regress into autism, there will be a temporal relationship; by chance alone, some children would develop autism after vaccination. So, from a scientific perspective, the paper didn’t show much.

Daniel Salmon, director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Vaccine Safety, explains:

I think autism was ripe for vaccine safety controversies for a few reasons: It becomes apparent to the parent early in childhood, around when we give a lot of vaccines. Autism seems to be increasing in incidence or prevalence, so there’s more of it out there. And we don’t fully understand what causes it … Parents are looking for answers, understandably. And so the issue was very ripe for it to be associated with vaccines—not by cause and effect, but by timing and temporality.

[The issue] led to a number of large epidemiological studies that looked at kids who were vaccinated with the MMR vaccine and those who weren’t, so there were control groups. And those studies found no association between the MMR vaccine and autism. Once it started to become clear that the MMR vaccine was not associated with autism, the hypothesis shifted from the MMR vaccine [as a cause of autism] to thimerosal, which at the time was used as a preservative in some childhood vaccines. Thimerosal was never used in the MMR vaccine, but it was used as a preservative in multidose vials of other vaccines.

That led to a number of large studies looking at thimerosal in vaccines and autism, and those studies also found no relationship. Then the hypothesis shifted again to the number of vaccines given at one time, so there were studies of that, which also found no relationship between vaccines and autism. At this point, we have 16 well-conducted, large population-based studies, carefully designed, done by different investigators in different countries, using different but strong methods. And all have found no relationship between MMR vaccine, thimerosal in vaccines, or the number of vaccines given and autism. The evidence is compelling.

[Emphasis added.]

There is no way to accurately estimate the vast number of parents who have been persuaded that their refusal to vaccinate is actually an indication of parental concern. But all it takes is a cursory glance at the data coming in from the southwest to see clearly that virtually all the cases of measles are amongst those who have not vaccinated. And while we have difficulty tallying up the numbers of those who have suffered needlessly from the disinformation campaign surrounding the MMR vaccine, it is certainly easier to see the consequences of the continuing lies about the COVID vaccine. Our World in Data has been able to account for only some of the extraordinary number of deaths:

From the very beginning of the pandemic in 2020, statistics revealed that those who were vaccinated were far less likely to be hospitalized or die from COVID. Kennedy and those who spread misinformation about the COVID vaccines are lying and have caused and will continue to cause needless death. Here are some relevant studies and articles:

“COVID-19-Associated Hospitalizations Among Vaccinated and Unvaccinated Adults 18 Years or Older in 13 US States, January 2021 to April 2022”:

In this cross-sectional study of US adults hospitalized with COVID-19 during January 2022 to April 2022 (during Omicron variant predominance), COVID-19-associated hospitalization rates were 10.5 times higher in unvaccinated persons and 2.5 times higher in vaccinated persons with no booster dose, respectively, compared with those who had received a booster dose.

“Latest CDC Data: Unvaccinated Adults 97 Times More Likely to Die from COVID-19 Than Boosted Adults”:

As of early December, unvaccinated adults were about 97 times more likely to die from COVID-19 than fully vaccinated people who had received boosters, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data … The CDC says that, as of Dec. 4, the weekly COVID-19 death rate among unvaccinated adults was 9.74 per 100,000 population, and the rate was 0.1 per 100,000 population for people 18 and older who were fully vaccinated with a booster dose.

“COVID-19 Vaccine Effectiveness, February 1, 2024”:

People who received the updated COVID-19 vaccine were 54% less likely to get COVID-19 during the four-month period from mid-September 2023 to January 2024. Updated COVID-19 vaccine boosts waning immunity. The virus that causes COVID-19 is always changing, and protection from infection or COVID-19 vaccination declines over time. Receiving an updated 2023-2024 COVID-19 vaccine can restore and provide enhanced protection against the variants currently responsible for most infections and hospitalizations in the United States.

Despite this evidence, Kennedy peddles misinformation and is going out of his way to make it more difficult for Americans to get the COVID vaccine. With over-inflated rhetoric, Kennedy is determined to un-do the procedure that has worked so well to protect us from COVID, the painstaking reevaluation of the changing COVID virus and reconfiguring the COVID boosters. And by unnecessarily insisting that these modifications be tested using placebos, he will invariably delay their availability.

As The Washington Post reported:

In his push for vaccine safety, Kennedy has repeatedly falsely linked vaccines to deaths without evidence, saying ‘that’s the danger of not having placebo-controlled trials.’ But experts say placebo-controlled trials — where one group of people gets a medicine or treatment and the other does not — would be irresponsible to apply to most vaccines because it could deprive people of immunizations already proved to prevent infectious disease. In practice, that could mean several thousand children in Chicago, for instance, would not get childhood vaccinations, while their neighbors did …

Experts say his claim that vaccines do not undergo pre-licensing safety trials is not true — vaccines go through several stages of clinical trials before approval. Thousands of people are studied along the way to determine vaccines’ safety and effectiveness before they are rolled out to the public. And after vaccines are in use, companies, health-care providers and the federal government monitor for additional adverse events.

If you are interested, several doctors have put together a “Table of Randomized Controlled Trials of Vaccines.”

As Factcheck.org suggests, the misinformation continues. Recently:

[Kennedy] has minimized the risk COVID-19 poses to kids and exaggerated the risk of the vaccine, incorrectly claiming that the shot poses a ‘profound risk’ to children. While serious side effects can occur, they are rare, and have not been shown to outweigh the benefits of the vaccine in protecting against COVID-19. Kennedy’s remarks come as he is reportedly considering removing the COVID-19 vaccine from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s childhood immunization schedule, a move that could reduce accessibility to the vaccine.

On April 22, when Fox News’ Jesse Watters asked about taking the COVID-19 vaccine off the schedule, Kennedy, who has long spread misinformation about vaccines, said the recommendation for children ‘was always dubious” because ‘kids had almost no risk for COVID-19.’

This is an extraordinary lie, and Kennedy does a profound disservice to every American family who has or has had to deal with taking their child to the hospital with COVID. In its study of pediatric COVID-19 hospitalizations from 2020 to 2024, the American Academy of Pediatrics wrote:

About 234,000 children under age 18 were hospitalized with confirmed cases of COVID-19 from fall 2020 to spring 2024, according to AAP analysis of data collected by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) …The number of COVID-19 hospitalizations varied substantially across time by waves of infection and emergence of new variants (see figure). The largest peak was in winter 2022 during the omicron surge, with 6,527 child hospitalizations the week of Jan. 15. In the final week of the report, April 27, 2024, 310 children with a confirmed COVID-19 case were admitted, among the lowest levels reported during the pandemic.

[Emphasis added.]

The experts call it vaccine hesitancy, but it is really the unwarranted fear provoked by a systematic campaign of disinformation. The reluctance of so many Americans to protect themselves and their children against measles and COVID is pervasive. The Washington Post revealed the shocking reality on May 8, 2025:

At least 216 children died of influenza in the United States this past flu season, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, the disease’s highest pediatric death toll in about 15 years …

‘Misinformation around vaccines has in recent years contributed to a rise in vaccine hesitancy and declining vaccination rates,’ New York State Health Commissioner James McDonald said in a news release. ‘Vaccines are the best protection we have, and do save lives, including the lives of very young children who are too young to receive certain vaccines.’ Only one of the 25 children who died in New York was vaccinated, McDonald said. Five of the children were too young to receive the vaccine.

[Emphasis added.]

There is no reason for so many of these children to have died. There is no reason why so many Americans died from COVID. Sadly, it will only get worse. Because the lawyer who kills has taken control of the agencies once dedicated to stopping the killing.