School-age child dies in Texas measles outbreak; health chief Kennedy now calls vaccine best protection
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A second child with measles has died in Texas, state officials said on Sunday (Apr 6), in an outbreak of the childhood disease that has resulted in nearly 500 cases in Texas and has spread across 22 states.
The school-aged child, who was unvaccinated and had no underlying health conditions, died on Thursday in the hospital from measles pulmonary failure, the Texas Department of State Health Services said.
"The child was receiving treatment for complications of measles while hospitalized," Aaron Davis, a spokesperson for UMC Health System in Lubbock, Texas, said in an email.
It is the second death of a child in Texas since the measles outbreak began in late January.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, in a post on X, identified the child as 8-year-old Daisy Hildebrand.
Kennedy, who has been an anti-vaccine advocate and previously has said vaccination is a personal choice, on Sunday said vaccines are the best protection against measles.
"The most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine," he said in the post on X. He said that as of Sunday there are 642 confirmed cases of measles, 499 of those in Texas.
Kennedy said in his post that he visited Texas to comfort the Hildebrand family after their daughter's death. He added that he got to know the family of the first child in Texas to die in the measles outbreak, Kayley Fehr, "after she passed away in February."
Kennedy said that teams from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have been redeployed to Texas at the request of the state's governor, Greg Abbott.
Kennedy has previously recommended Vitamin A as a measles treatment, along with good nutrition. While Vitamin A has been shown in some studies in developing countries to lessen the severity of symptoms, it can lead to liver toxicity in high quantities.
Kennedy's post about vaccines came after Republican U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy, who is also a physician and chair of the Senate health committee, wrote on X after the child's death was disclosed: "Everyone should be vaccinated."
"Top health officials should say so unequivocally b/4 another child dies," Cassidy wrote on X.
Cassidy had backed Kennedy's confirmation after Kennedy promised not to make changes to vaccine oversight.
The measles vaccine is 97 percent effective after two shots.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on its website says the vaccine is "the best protection against measles," which spreads through the air when an infected person sneezes or coughs.
KENNEDY HEARING POSTPONED
Cassidy last week called for Kennedy to appear before the Senate health committee on Apr 10 to discuss the US health department's restructuring in which 10,000 people were being laid off, including from the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But on Friday a committee official said the hearing would not occur on Apr 10 because seven days notice had not been given per committee procedure. No date has been set.
The Texas Department of State Health Services on Friday reported 59 new measles cases in three days, a 15 percent jump, for a total of 481 in the state since late January.
Related measles outbreaks have been reported in other states, including New Mexico and Oklahoma. In addition, an unvaccinated New Mexico adult tested positive for measles after dying in March.
As of Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a weekly nationwide increase of 124 measles cases, bringing the total to 607 so far this year. That compares to a nationwide total in 2024 of 285 reported cases.
CDC officials said that 97 percent of US cases are unvaccinated or those whose vaccination status is unknown.
Pediatricians and other doctors are pushing back against vaccine hesitancy and warning parents that vitamin A and other supplements touted by vaccine critics will not protect their children from the highly contagious and potentially fatal disease.
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