US measles elimination status threatened due to 2024 outbreak

Despite occasional outbreaks, the U.S. has been able to maintain its elimination status. Cases have popped up due to international travel and unvaccinated or undervaccinated communities.

This year, the number of measles cases have soared in part due to several localized outbreak, including at a children's hospital and daycare center in Philadelphia, an elementary school in Florida and at a migrant center in Chicago. Measles is so infectious that a measles patient can infect up to 90% of close contacts who are not immune.

Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center and an attending physician in the division of infectious diseases at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, pointed out that almost all people in the U.S. who have had measles in recent years either traveled internationally to a country where measles has not been eliminated or were around someone who traveled internationally, and that immigrants are not responsible for the sporadic outbreaks.

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