The measles outbreak in Texas and New Mexico is now close to 300 reported cases, surpassing the total number of cases in all of the U.S. in 2024.
The outbreak is happening in remote, rural areas. There have been a few isolated cases reported in 13 other states — not related to the Texas outbreak. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the nationwide risk remains low and that vaccination is the key to prevention.
Still, doctors say it’s a good time to remember how dangerous and long-lasting the health consequences of measles can be.
Dr. Alex Cvijanovich has been a practicing pediatrician for more than 20 years. She says she’s still haunted by the memory of a teenage boy she treated at the start of her career in Utah.
The boy had contracted measles as a 7-month-old, when he was too young to be vaccinated. “He got the virus from a child in his neighborhood who was unvaccinated,” says Cvijanovich, who now practices in New Mexico.
It was a relatively mild case of measles, and the infant recovered. She says he grew up to be a healthy, bright kid — an honor student.
Then in middle school, he started to develop troubling symptoms. “He started getting lost between classes, lost like he couldn’t find what class to go to next,” Cvijanovich says.
Worried, the teen’s parents took him to a series of doctors to figure out what was wrong, until a pediatric neurologist finally suspected a condition called subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, or SSPE. It’s a degenerative neurological condition that typically develops seven to 10 years after a measles infection. It is almost always fatal. Cvijanovich was part of the hospital team that confirmed the diagnosis.
“The problem is that there is no treatment for it,” she says. “And he basically…
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