[ad_1]
President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F Kennedy Jr., said he visited Texas after it was revealed that a second child died in the state.
Kennedy reportedly attended the child’s funeral on Sunday.
The eight -year -old girl died early Thursday morning of “measles longmonale failure” while being treated at a hospital in Lubbock, Texas, according to the New York Times.
Her death is second linked to a measuring outbreak in Western Texas and the second in a decade to the disease in the US. Dozens of residents in the region – also in border states – are infected.
The UMC health system said on Sunday that the girl was not vaccinated against the disease and had no underlying health conditions that contributed to her death.
The first death in the region was also an unauthorized child who passed away in February. There may be a third death – an unauthorized individual in New Mexico – who tested positive for measles. Health officials are still trying to confirm whether measles was the cause of the death of the individual.
Western Texas reported 480 cases of measles, which led to 56 hospitalizations since the outbreak in January. Infections became 54 people in New Mexico and another 10 in Oklahoma.
Public Health officials in the region predict that the outbreak will continue for a year, jeopardizing the elimination status of the area – which it earned in 2000.
Measles is very contagious. It can sit in the air for up to two hours after someone has left a room and can spread through breath, cough or sneeze.
In most cases, measles symptoms – such as rash, high fever, cough, runny noses and red eyes – will subside in a few weeks. But in rare cases, it can cause pneumonia, which is especially dangerous for children, the elderly and individuals with immune systems in jeopardy.
The disease can also cause brain swelling, which can cause blindness, deafness and intellectual disabilities.
Kennedy criticized the outbreak, especially if the HHS boss is a vocal vaccine skeptic. He broadly supported the measles vaccine, but also emphasized alternatives and untested treatments to combat the disease, such as the use of COD deliverance oil.
Doctors in Texas went to the Times That Kennedy’s approval of alternative treatments has contributed to some patients waiting to seek medical care, while also consuming toxic levels of vitamin A.
Experts are concerned that the Trump administration’s decision to withdraw financing by local health departments will also increase the likelihood of major, multiple outbreaks.
Dr Peter Marks, who resigned on Sunday from his post at the Food and Drug Administration, where he supervised the agency’s vaccine program, became Kennedy and his staff the child’s death.
“This is the epitome of an absolute unnecessary death,” Marks told the Associated Press On Sunday. “These kids need to be vaccinated – that’s how you prevent people from dying from measles.”
He said he warned the Senate that more deaths related to measles would occur if the Trump administration refused to take more aggressive action to combat the outbreak.
The Senate’s Health Committee called Kennedy to testify on Thursday.
One of the members of the committee is Republican Senator Bill Cassidy, a doctor and a vaccine advocate. Although he joined his Republican colleagues to confirm Kennedy during his trial, he took a stronger stand on the need for vaccinations than the HHS chief.
Cassidy issued a statement on Sunday stating that “everyone should be vaccinated.”
He said there is’ no benefit of getting measles’ and that ‘top health officials should say so unequivocally [before] another child dies. ‘
From Friday, the US has more than 600 measles cases this year, more than double the number of cases in all 2024.
Lubbock’s Director of Public Health, Katherine Wells, said NBC News That the actual number of infected individuals is probably much higher than reported, as many people who are infected may not be tested for the disease.
She said she and other health officials begs families to get their children vaccinated against measles.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, only two doses of the MMR vaccine are needed for vaccination, and are 97 percent effective. The MMR vaccine is safe and has been safely administered to children for decades.
[ad_2]
Source link
