This Infectious Disease Has Increased 1,500% Nationwide: See PA Data

An ongoing measles outbreak may be the “canary in the coal mine” signaling public health dangers as vaccine hesitancy grows, according to a new report from the investigative journalism site ProPublica.

Spiking rates of pertussis — or whooping cough rates, coupled with lower vaccine coverage — are another bellwether of a return of childhood illnesses, the ProPublica report said. Like measles, whooping cough is preventable by vaccine.

Pennsylvania is one of 39 states where measles vaccine rates have fallen below herd immunity rates starting in 2023, according to the report. Pertussis vaccination rates have also declined in Pennsylvania between 2013 and 2023, according to the ProPublica report.

“This is not just measles,” Dr. Adam Ratner, a pediatric infectious diseases doctor in New York City and author of the book “Booster Shots: The Urgent Lessons of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children’s Health,” told ProPublica, “It’s a bright-red warning light.”

Cases of pertussis, the disease that causes intense coughing spells, have skyrocketed by more than 1,500 percent nationwide since hitting a record low during the pandemic, according to ProPublica. The site used data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Pertussis can be life-threatening in infants and young children, leading to pneumonia, pauses in breathing, dehydration, and even brain damage. On average, between two and four people a year die from whooping cough. Last year, 10 people died and so far this year, two people and possibly a third have died as whooping cough cases are on track to exceed reported illnesses in 2024.

Of the 35,435 reported pertussis cases last year, 2,889 were in Pennsylvania, with the incidence rate about 22.27 per 100,000 residents, according to the CDC’s 2024 provisional pertussis surveillance report.

ProPublica’s review of state health department records shows that two babies in Louisiana died of pertussis in the last six months. Washington state just reported its first confirmed death from pertussis in more than a decade; Idaho and South Dakota each reported a death this year; and Oregon last year reported two as well as its highest number of cases since 1950.

At the same time, measles has sickened 800 people in 10 outbreaks so far this year, according to the most recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An outbreak is defined as one in which there are three or more related cases. The agency said 94 percent of cases this year are part of an outbreak.

Cases have been confirmed in 25 states, including in Pennsylvania.

Health officials across Eastern Pennsylvania have been warning of exposure in recent weeks, including in Montgomery County, Bucks County and Philadelphia. The first measles case in the state for 2025 was reported in Montgomery County in March.

“My concern is that there is going to be a large outbreak of not just measles, but other vaccine-preventable diseases as well, that’s going to end up causing a lot of harm, and possibly deaths in children and young adults,” Dr. Anna Durbin, a professor in the Department of International Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who has spent her career studying vaccines, told ProPublica.

“And it’s completely preventable,” Durbin said.

Read the full report on ProPublica