The measles outbreak in Texas, New Mexico, and Oklahoma could be a bit more difficult to reign in than some think, as a health official said it could be a year before things cool down.
As of Tuesday, there have been 321 cases reported in the three states, with Texas having 279, New Mexico reporting 38, and Oklahoma reporting four. The cases have resulted in at least 38 patients being hospitalized, and 95 cases have been in children aged 4 and younger, while 130 have been in kids ages 5 to 17.
While the majority of cases that are popping up are in people who were unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status, six people were found to have received at least one dose of the measles-mumps-rubella shot.
So far, only one death has been reported as a result of the outbreak, a school-age child who was unvaccinated and had no prior health conditions. Another death in New Mexico is still under investigation, as an unvaccinated person who died had tested positive for measles.
As many look to mitigate the outbreak, health officials like Katherine Wells, the director of Lubbock Public Health, say it may be a while before the outbreak is finished.
“This is going to be a large outbreak, and we are still on the side where we are increasing the number of cases. … I’m really thinking this is going to be a year-long,” Wells said at a briefing Tuesday.
“I just think, it being so rural now, multistate, it’s just going to take a lot more boots on the ground, a lot more work to get things under control. It’s not an isolated population.”
One way that Wells and other officials have said the outbreak will be contained is through an increase in testing. To help, labs have been set up in Lubbock, the epicenter of the outbreak, speeding up the time it takes to get results.
The CDC is also assisting in the efforts to curb the outbreak.
Dr. Philip Huang, the director of Dallas County Health and Human Services, says that the efforts to stop the spread of the disease are “dependent” on federal support.
“Our staffing to be able to do vaccination clinics and our epidemiology staff to do the investigations and contact tracing … so much of that is federally funded that we are very dependent on and very concerned about some of the potential staffing cuts that we’re seeing at the federal level, as well as some of the budget cuts,” he said Tuesday.