DALLAS — If Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were your electrician, you’d get a shock every time you touched a light switch. As U.S. Health and Human Services secretary, he is dangerously steering us away from one of the greatest public health victories in human history.
His disregard of facts about infectious disease is unacceptable as measles spreads. In North Texas, residents could soon witness firsthand the needless suffering caused by rejecting safe, effective vaccines.
Kennedy visited a farm outside Hillsboro last week, and during a brief session with reporters, he claimed that a Gaines County child whose funeral he attended didn’t die of measles (she did) and that Europe had 127,000 cases of measles last year (sort of). He also said news media organizations focus too much on measles and not enough on autism and chronic disease.
Where do we start? Yes, the child died because she had contracted measles. About 1 in 20 children with measles develop pneumonia, and 1 to 3 of every 1,000 infected children die of respiratory or neurological complications of the viral disease.
Kennedy’s statement about measles in Europe was — perhaps unintentionally — misleading. The 27 member countries of the European Union had 35,212 measles cases in 2024. That is tens of thousands fewer than he said, but almost 10 times more than in 2023. The number he cited probably came from a World Health Organization report. It included measles cases in countries like Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, which are usually considered part of central Asia rather than Europe.
We also dispute the notion that chronic diseases don’t receive much news coverage or publicity. Talk shows, newspapers, magazines, podcasts, social media and websites constantly push out health information and advice — good, bad and insane — about diet, exercise and chronic conditions.
In contrast, when was the last time you saw a television ad or heard a snappy jingle for the MMR vaccine? Probably never. Before this outbreak, how often did talk show hosts discuss measles or news sites post stories about it? Infectious diseases that were eliminated in this country, as measles was in 2000, only make news when they reappear.
Toward the end of the Q&A in Hillsboro, Kennedy said his agency is developing a new worksheet to instruct doctors how to treat measles. That’s like suggesting alternative firefighting techniques when a simple burn ban could prevent the wildfire.
The traditional approach to measles — two doses of the MMR vaccine for young children — works. Before the South Plains outbreak, the last U.S. death from measles was in 2015.
Since the Gaines County measles outbreak began, it has grown to 702 cases, with 91 patients sick enough to need hospitalization and two deaths. We’ve exported the disease to New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas and Mexico. Kennedy’s approach to the ongoing outbreak, and to infectious disease in general, is indefensible. It just makes Americans get measles again.
— The Dallas Morning News
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