- Doctors are reporting increases in infectious diseases, including measles, whooping cough, rotavirus, and others, especially in children.
- Experts say the primary reason for the rise of these illnesses is the increasing number of adults and children who are not vaccinated.
- They say it’s important for medical professionals to educate their patients about the safety and effectiveness of vaccines.
Doctors are reporting what they describe as an alarming rise in a variety of serious illnesses due to declining vaccination rates.
Children who aren’t vaccinated appear to be bearing the brunt of these illnesses, but officials also note an increase in unvaccinated adults requiring hospitalization, including some who refuse tetanus shots and blood transfusions.
The news comes a week after President Donald Trump signed an executive order reaffirming an assessment by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that aligns “the United States’ childhood vaccine practices with scientific evidence and best practices from peer, developed countries.”
The executive order notes that in 1980, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended children in the United States receive 23 vaccine doses in seven shots against seven different diseases. In 2024, that number had risen to at least 84 vaccine doses in at least 57 shots for 17 diseases, more than any other developed nation.
In January, HHS officials led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. released a new childhood vaccination schedule that recommended vaccination against 11 diseases. The six other diseases were recommended only for children at higher risk.
“After an exhaustive review of the evidence, we are aligning the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule with international consensus while strengthening transparency and informed consent. This decision protects children, respects families, and rebuilds trust in public health,” Health Secretary Kennedy said in a
However, experts who spoke with Healthline say the decrease in vaccination rates and the resulting increase in disease are worrisome.
“I am very concerned about the increase in cases of vaccine-preventable infections in children in the United States,” said William Schaffner, MD, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee and a specialist in infectious diseases.
“Large measles outbreaks have been well-publicized; less well known are recent increases in whooping cough and rotavirus (diarrheal) infections in children,” he said. “There also have been clusters of chickenpox. All these illnesses can make children feel miserable, and that would be bad enough, but all can result in serious illness that requires hospitalization and can cause death.”
By late May, the CDC
The major measles outbreaks this year have occurred in South Carolina, with 669 cases so far. Utah is next with 484 cases, followed by Texas with 182 and Florida with 139.
About 21% of this year’s cases involve children under 5. About 72% involve children and young adults 19 years and younger.
About 6% of cases this year have required hospitalization, compared to 11% last year. So far, no deaths related to measles have been reported this year. Last year, three deaths were recorded.
The CDC reports that 92% of measles cases this year involve unvaccinated individuals or those with unknown vaccination status.
“Measles infection can result in serious complications, hospitalization, and death. Vaccination remains a critical tool for the prevention of measles infection and severe disease,” CDC officials wrote in
Health experts recently told the New York Times that measles can be a harbinger of things to come. They say that’s because measles is highly contagious and can be the first disease to spike as vaccination rates broadly decline.
Graham Tse, MD, a pediatrician and chief medical officer of MemorialCare Miller Children’s & Women’s Hospital in California, is among the physicians noticing the trend.
Tse said that his facility had gone more than two decades without a measles case. Now, these cases are starting to crop up.
“I’m deeply concerned,” he said. “We’re talking about a disease that can have serious consequences,” Tse said the reason for the increase in cases is simple. “It’s vaccine hesitancy,” he said. “It’s because more and more people aren’t getting vaccinated.”
Increasing rates of infectious diseases have spread beyond measles, raising alarms among experts.
Meghan Hofto, MD, a pediatric hospitalist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, told the New York Times that she and her colleagues have treated more children than usual for persistent diarrhea.
She blames rotavirus, a highly contagious infection most common in children under 5 that had largely been contained by vaccination.
Hofto told the Times that she had treated only four or five children with rotavirus in the past decade. Now, she said she had treated about that many already this year, and none of them were vaccinated. She said many children with a stomach virus might need a day or so of IV fluids, but these patients were being hospitalized for three or four days.
Danelle Fisher, MD, a pediatrician at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in California, said that until recently, she had seen only one rotavirus case in 19 years. Now, they are cropping up again. “This is literally what happens if you don’t get vaccinated,” she said.
Hofto said she has treated several infants with whooping cough who had stopped breathing after coughing fits. “It’s hard to know when they’re safe to go home,” she told the Times.
Hofto and other doctors say unvaccinated children with high fevers sometimes need to be subjected to more invasive testing, including spinal taps, to rule out life threatening infections that vaccinated children are protected against.
Despite the dangers, doctors say some parents still decline to have their children vaccinated even after emergency treatment.
The trend isn’t limited to children. Doctors told the Times that there is an increasing number of unvaccinated adults who are refusing to get tetanus shots even after being treated for serious infections from cuts and other injuries.
Two anesthesiologists told the Times they have had patients refuse to consent to blood transfusions before surgery because they didn’t want blood from vaccinated donors.
Tse said he is concerned that these trends will continue because of the confusion and misunderstanding surrounding vaccines.
“I don’t see anything that is changing right now,” he said.
Fisher agreed that it may take time to reverse this tide. “These diseases are happening, and it’s going to get worse and worse if people don’t get vaccinated,” she said. “I’m afraid it’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
Tse said he tries to hear people’s concerns about vaccines and then urges them to educate themselves about vaccinations. “I tell them to really try and find the truth,” he said. “Vaccines are safe and help prevent disease, illness, and death.”
Fisher shared a similar strategy. “I try to have a respectable dialogue,” she said. “But I worry about these children and the children around them.”
The CDC reports that
Health officials consider a vaccination rate of 95% to be necessary to develop “herd immunity” against measles, for example.
Schaffner said this trend is disturbing. “The U.S. has long been the international leader in deploying vaccines universally to make growing up safer,” he said. “We seem to be slipping back to the bad old days, letting nasty viruses spread, finding the unvaccinated.”
Schaffner said the consequences go beyond the person who isn’t vaccinated.
“There now are many immunocompromised children living among us, going to day care and school,” he explained. “These children often have a medical contraindication to receive vaccines or respond to them sub-optimally. Because their immune systems do not work well, when they become infected, they become seriously ill.”
He said the solution is simple.
“Having all the rest of us protected, thus creating a cocoon of protection around them. For that to work, vaccination must be comprehensive — all the rest of us must be vaccinated,” Schaffner said.
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