[SutterBrother]

Originally Posted by troutman

Measles outbreak and deaths in Texas and New Mexico. Your move Bobby!

Parents should be charged in the deaths of unvaccinated children. They are victims of parental negligence.

RFK should simply be infected with every disease that he advocates not vaccinating for. Let biology sort it out for him.

At least 124 cases have been reported since late January, mostly among children and teenagers who were unvaccinated or whose vaccination status was unknown.

A child has died of measles in West Texas, the first known death in an outbreak that is spreading in the region and in neighboring New Mexico, state health officials said on Wednesday.

The patient was an unvaccinated school-age child, according to officials in Lubbock, Texas, and the Department of State Health Services.

The outbreak comes amid growing concerns among public health experts about declining vaccination rates and the confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent vaccine skeptic, as the nation’s health secretary.

At a meeting of cabinet officials at the White House on Wednesday, Mr. Kennedy downplayed the news, saying that federal health officials were “watching” the outbreak and noting that there had been others this year.

“So it’s not unusual,” he said. He did not mention vaccination or describe steps the federal government might be taking to help stop the outbreak.

In “The Measles Book,” published by Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine nonprofit he founded, Mr. Kennedy wrote that “measles outbreaks have been fabricated to create fear,” leading government officials to “inflict unnecessary and risky vaccines on millions of children for the sole purpose of fattening industry profits.”

As of Feb. 20, there had been three measles outbreaks in the United States this year and 16 last year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The outbreaks last year totaled 285 cases; this year’s tally so far is nearly half that.

Most of the cases have been centered in Gaines County, an area on the western edge of the state. It is home to thousands of Mennonites, an insular Christian group that historically has had lower vaccination rates. Officials said the child who died Wednesday had lived in Gaines County.

Last year, roughly 82 percent of the county’s population had received the M.M.R. vaccine. Experts say that at least 95 percent of people in a community need to be vaccinated in order to stave off outbreaks.

NY Times (paywalled)