US Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy, Runior. traveled toWestern TexasOn Sunday after the second unvaccinated child of ageFrom a disease associated with measles.
Before the “Make America Healthy” tour through the southwestern US, Kennedy said on social media on social media that he was in the district of Gaines to comfort the families who had to bury two young children who died. Seminole isEpicenter of emergence of measlesIt began in late January and continues to swell, with almost 500 cases only in Texas.
He said he was working with Texas health officials to “control measles”.
The child had no basic health conditions and died Thursday from “what the child’s doctors described as measles pulmonary insufficiency,” State Department of State Health Services in Texas said on SundayIn the statement. Aaron Davis, a spokesman for the UMC health system in Lubok, Texas, said the child “received treatment for measles complications while being hospitalized”.
This is the third known death associated with measles tied to this phenomenon. One wasAnother child of school ageIn Texas, and the other wasAdult in new Mexico. They were neither vaccinated.
Kennedy, an anti -vaccine agent before climbing the role of the nation’s top secretary of health earlier this year, opposed the encouragement of widespread vaccinations as the emergence of measles deteriorated under his watch.
“The most effective way to prevent measles spread is the MMR vaccine,” Kennedy said in a long statement published on X. Measles, mumps and rubella vaccine has been used safely for more than 60 years and is 97% effective against measles after two doses.
US control and prevention teams are “redisplaced”, Kennedy added, although the nation’s public health agency has never returned to withdraw during the growing crisis. Neither the CDC nor the Health Department included death in Friday’s measles reports, but added it to their points on Sunday.
At national level, the United States has more than twice the number ofCases of measlesIt was seen in all 2024.
More than two months in,Western TexasIt is believed that the appearance is spreading in New Mexico, Oklahoma and Kansas,Sick nearly 570 people. The World Health Organization has also released Texas -related cases in Mexico. The number of cases in Texas shot for 81 years between March 28 and April 4 and 16 more people were hospitalized.
The Republican American Senator was Louisiana Cassidi,a liver doctorWhose voice helped Kend Kennedy’s confirmation, called on Sunday for stronger messages from health officialsIn the announcement of x.
“Everyone should be vaccinated! There is no treatment for measles. There is no benefit to getting measles,” he wrote. “Top health officers have to say so unequivocally B/4 another child dies.”
A CDC spokesman noticed the efficacy of the measles vaccine on Sunday, but did not stop calling people to get it.
Departing from long -standing public health messages about vaccination, the spokesman called the decision “personal” and said people should talk to their doctor and “should be informed about the potential risks and benefits associated with vaccines.”
The misinformation on how to prevent and treat measles, hinder the stable response to public health, including claims for vitamin A supplements, which encourage supporters of Kennedy and holistic medicine, despite doctors’ warnings that it should be given according to the doctor’s orders and that it can be too dangerous.
Doctors at the Children’s Hospital for the covenant in Lubok, where the first death of measles occurred, say they treated less than 10 children for liver problems from vitamin A toxicity, which they found when conducting routine laboratory tests for children with measles that have measles. Dr. Lara Nsonson, Chief Medical Officer, said patients reported using vitamin A to treat and prevent the virus.
Dr. Peter Marx, former head of the Food and Drug Directorate of Food and Drug DirectorateHe said responsibility for death rests with Kennedy and his staff. Marx was expelled from the FDA after disagreements with Kennedy for vaccine safety.
“This is the epitome of absolute unnecessary death,” Marx told the Associated Press in an interview on Sunday. “These children need to be vaccinated – so you prevent people from dying of measles.”
Marx also said he recently warned US senators that more deaths would occur if the administration did not set a more aggressive response to the emergence. Kennedy has been called to testify before the Senate Health Committee on Thursday.
Experts and local health officials expect the occurrence of occurrenceA few more monthsIf not a year. In western Texas, the vast majority of cases are in unvaccinated people and children younger than 17 years.
Several states facing vaccines that can be prevented-and reducing childhood vaccination rates at national level-some are concerned that measles can cost the United States status to eliminate the disease.
Measles is a respiratory virus that can survive in the air for up to two hours. Up to 9 out of 10 people who are susceptible will receive the virus if exposed,According to CDC. The first shot is recommended for children aged 12 to 15 months, and the second at the age of 4 to 6 years.
This story was originally shown on Fortune.com
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