Hospitals and health officials nationwide are spending more on measles testing and vaccination campaigns as the disease continues spreading. The federal government pitches in with $100 million in aid to states from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That agency lists nearly 4,100 confirmed cases since January in 45 states and Washington, D.C., as of last week – about 1,800 more than in all of 2025 and the highest level since 1991.

Measles, which causes an itchy rash, is one of the most contagious diseases, spreading when an infected person coughs or sneezes. Symptoms also include fever that may spike to more than 104 degrees, runny nose and red or watery eyes. The virus can linger up two hours indoors in droplets suspended in the air. The disease can lead to pneumonia (lung infection), ear infection and occasionally swelling of the brain, with a risk of convulsions, deafness, intellectual disability or blindness.

About one-quarter of 2026 cases have occurred in Pennsylvania, where state officials say five people with the virus have died. In neighboring New York, with 108 cases (highest since 2019), Gov. Kathy Hochul last week declared measles a statewide health emergency. She relaxed vaccination rules to make it easier for pharmacists, midwives and other health care workers to give shots.

Measles was largely eradicated from the United States a quarter-century ago. Cases dropped sharply after a second vaccine dose became routine following a 1989 outbreak. But vaccination rates have declined amid fears that the childhood vaccine — which also protects against mumps and rubella — might be linked to autism. Dozens of scientific studies found no link between the shot and autism, a developmental condition. "The measles vaccine prevents measles in 97% of the people who take it," the president's health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., told a Senate hearing last spring. “That's what the science says."

Governor says: "No one should get seriously ill or die from a vaccine-preventable disease." – Kathy Hochul, D-N.Y.

Doctor says: “We know the vaccine is safe. As more families opt out of vaccinating their children, or delay it a few years, communities grow more vulnerable to a measles outbreak." – Dr. Howard Markel, retired pediatrician and medical historian in Ann Arbor, Mich.

CDC facts: About one out of five measles patients need hospital care. One of every 20 children with measles get pneumonia, the most common cause of death from measles in youngsters.