US Reportedly Loses Measles Elimination Status After 26 Years

Pennsylvania outbreak

The change comes as Pennsylvania faces the country's worst measles outbreak in half a century. The state reported 1,542 cases and 305 hospitalizations as of Friday, November 13.

The state also announced an additional measles-associated death that day in Montour County, which has four reported cases. It is the seventh confirmed death in Pennsylvania this year. The virus has been reported in more than two-thirds of the state's counties.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported 5,412 confirmed measles cases nationwide this year.

What experts said

Paul Offit, a physician and director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, called eliminating measles a "tremendous achievement." Losing the status, he said, is "a tremendous step backward."

Noel T. Brewer, a public health professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said: "The U.S. is no longer a safe place for children with respect to measles." He added: "It's unconscionable that we have this many cases."

Brewer chairs the National Verification Committee for the Elimination of Measles, Rubella and Congenital Rubella Syndrome. That group reviewed U.S. data and passed its recommendation to PAHO.

The American Academy of Family Physicians called the loss "a dangerous and serious step backward for public health." It said the loss "does not mean the MMR vaccine has stopped working. It means we must restore confidence in the safety and efficacy of life-saving public health tools."

How status is judged and regained

PAHO, a panel under the World Health Organization, based its ruling on measles data from January 2025 to June of this year. It has 36 members from the Americas and meets every few years to reverify measles and rubella status, based on vaccination rates and transmission. Canada lost its status last year.

A country is considered endemic when one strain of the virus spreads without interruption for 12 months. Regaining elimination status takes at least one year without continued transmission.

The country must also submit an action plan to the WHO. The plan must set out how it will improve disease surveillance, raise vaccination rates and coordinate responses to future outbreaks.