02-13-2025, 12:28 AM
https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/02/m...-counties/
An outbreak of measles in one of Texas' least vaccinated counties continues to rapidly expand, with officials reporting 24 cases Tuesday, up from just nine confirmed on Friday.
According to an update by the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), all 24 cases identified in the two-week-old outbreak are in unvaccinated people. Nine of the patients (37.5 percent) required hospitalization...
Gaines has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state and also one of the highest rates of kindergartners with "conscientious exemptions" to school vaccination requirements. In the 2023–2024 school year, just about 82 percent of kindergartners in Gaines were up to date on routine childhood vaccines, including MMR. That's significantly below the target of 95 percent, the level required to prevent infectious diseases from spreading onward in a community...
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Measles is one of the most infectious diseases known. The measles virus spreads through the air and can linger in the airspace of a room for up to two hours after an infected person has left. Ninety percent of unvaccinated people who are exposed will fall ill with the disease, which is marked by a very high fever and a telltale rash. Typically, 1 in 5 unvaccinated people with measles in the US end up hospitalized, and 1 in 20 develop pneumonia. Between 1 to 3 in 1,000 die of the infection. In rare cases, it can cause a fatal disease of the central nervous system called Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis later in life. Measles can also wipe out immune responses to other infections (a phenomenon known as immune amnesia), making people vulnerable to other infectious diseases.
An outbreak of measles in one of Texas' least vaccinated counties continues to rapidly expand, with officials reporting 24 cases Tuesday, up from just nine confirmed on Friday.
According to an update by the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), all 24 cases identified in the two-week-old outbreak are in unvaccinated people. Nine of the patients (37.5 percent) required hospitalization...
Gaines has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state and also one of the highest rates of kindergartners with "conscientious exemptions" to school vaccination requirements. In the 2023–2024 school year, just about 82 percent of kindergartners in Gaines were up to date on routine childhood vaccines, including MMR. That's significantly below the target of 95 percent, the level required to prevent infectious diseases from spreading onward in a community...
(Emphasis added.)
More...
Measles is one of the most infectious diseases known. The measles virus spreads through the air and can linger in the airspace of a room for up to two hours after an infected person has left. Ninety percent of unvaccinated people who are exposed will fall ill with the disease, which is marked by a very high fever and a telltale rash. Typically, 1 in 5 unvaccinated people with measles in the US end up hospitalized, and 1 in 20 develop pneumonia. Between 1 to 3 in 1,000 die of the infection. In rare cases, it can cause a fatal disease of the central nervous system called Subacute sclerosing panencephalitis later in life. Measles can also wipe out immune responses to other infections (a phenomenon known as immune amnesia), making people vulnerable to other infectious diseases.
