Measles outbreak in the United States in 30 states as it spreads in Ohio and Alaska

NEW YORK – The United States recorded 25 new cases of measles last week, bringing the total number of cases this year to 1,148 in the country's worst epidemic in a quarter of a century, health officials said Monday. .

The 2.2% increase in the number of cases between July 11 and July 18 includes new cases in Ohio and Alaska, bringing to 30 the total number of states affected by the outbreak, said the US Center Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The latest report was the first since June 10 that the highly contagious and sometimes deadly disease spread to other states.

Nevertheless, health experts were encouraged by the fact that the number of new weekly cases declined after an increase of more than one hundred cases in a week earlier this year.

While 25 new cases are up from 14 in each of the last two weeks, the number of cases reported during a week has not exceeded 30 since June 24.

"We have made considerable efforts to promote immunization in the areas affected by the epidemic and this has been very effective in reducing the number of cases," said Theresa Madaline, epidemiologist at Montefiore Hospital in New York.

Health experts say the numbers indicate that the epidemic may be in the process of subsiding.

"We are certainly on the right side of this curve," said Peter Pitts, president of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest and former US chief of the Food and Drug Administration. "It does not mean that increased and constant vigilance is not necessary."

The number of cases registered in the United States in 2019 – the highest annual total since 2,126 in 1992 – includes both active and resolved cases since then. No deaths related to measles have been reported.

The virus is especially prevalent among school-aged children whose parents have refused to give them the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine, which confers immunity to the disease. A vocal fringe of American parents is concerned that the vaccine could cause autism, despite scientific studies that refuted these claims.

Lack of immunization poses a public health risk to vulnerable people who are unable to receive the vaccine, health officials said.

The disease was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000, which means that there has been no continuous transmission of the disease for a year. Nevertheless, cases of viruses occur and spread through travelers from countries where measles is common.

CDC officials warned that the country could lose its measles elimination status if the epidemic, which began in October 2018 in New York, would continue until October 2019.

(Additional report by Manas Mishra in Bengaluru and Peter Szekely in New York)