A fifth unvaccinated person has died in Pennsylvania's measles outbreak, the state's health department announced on Wednesday, as the case tally rose to 943 across 39 counties.
The deceased was a resident of Lancaster County, the epicentre of the outbreak, which began in late April. Lancaster County alone has recorded 381 cases and three of the five deaths. Of the earlier deaths, two were infants too young to be vaccinated — a newborn boy and a six-week-old girl. The other two were an unvaccinated 18-year-old from Mifflin County who developed a severe neurological complication of measles, and an unvaccinated 40-year-old woman with chronic underlying conditions, including COPD.
Pennsylvania had not reported a measles death in 35 years before this outbreak, and these five are the only measles deaths recorded in the United States this year. Last year the country saw three — two otherwise healthy, unvaccinated school-aged children in Texas and an unvaccinated adult in New Mexico — all connected to a large outbreak in West Texas that spilled into neighbouring states. Before 2025, the United States had recorded no measles death since 2015.
The case numbers tell a similar story of resurgence. The state has reported 943 cases, including 119 in the last seven days, with at least 176 people hospitalised. Nationally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has tallied at least 3,659 cases this year, more than in 2025 and the highest figure on record since 1991.
The CDC's accounting of deaths, however, has become a point of contention. Under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the agency has resisted reporting the Pennsylvania deaths and altered the criteria for what counts as a measles death; it currently reports only two, and it is not clear which two. Measles was declared eliminated from the United States in 2000 on the strength of high vaccination rates, but falling coverage and record levels of exemptions have brought the virus back.
On the ground, Pennsylvania nurses have administered more than 8,500 doses of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine this year, including over 5,500 at pop-up clinics in outbreak areas. The health department repeated on Wednesday that two doses of MMR provide 97 percent lifetime protection.
