In Pennsylvania, state authorities and the federal U.S. Department of Health are arguing over whether to recognize four measles deaths amid one of the largest and deadliest outbreaks in the country. The state health department asked the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for emergency support, but said it would accept it only after these deaths were officially acknowledged.
This is stated in a letter from Pennsylvania Health Secretary Debra Bogen, sent Wednesday evening to CDC Director Erika Schwartz. Bogen wrote that the CDC’s refusal to publicly acknowledge these deaths undermines the state’s efforts to fight the outbreak, and warned that the request for assistance would be withdrawn if the agency did not begin reporting information about the dead transparently and accurately.
According to the letter, the decision not to include measles deaths in the national statistics was made by U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., known as an anti-vaxxer. He questioned whether the cause of death of the four people was indeed the measles virus, and the conflict over the outbreak became part of a broader confrontation between Kennedy and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, a Democrat.
The secretary accuses Shapiro of politicizing the situation and of failing to request federal help in time, although the state had previously declined it, believing it could manage on its own.
Since the announcement of the first two deaths on August 25, the outbreak has accelerated sharply: the number of cases has risen from 393 to more than 700 cases in 37 counties. Vaccination rates for measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) in the state have also declined: more than 3,500 shots were given in August, and about 1,100 in the first half of September. Infectious disease experts consider Kennedy’s intervention in the work of regional authorities highly unusual and warn that it could distort residents’ perception of the risk of measles. It was previously reported that after Kennedy’s personnel purges on the CDC vaccine advisory committee, several states began preparing for the possible removal of measles, chickenpox, and polio vaccines from the list of recommended shots.
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