Houston has been hit with a minor measles outbreak, marking the return of the disease to Texas since two years ago, with health officials pointing fingers at declining vaccination rates as the culprit, this concerning development found footing last week when the Texas Department of State Health Services confirmed the two cases, prompting local health authorities to sound the alarm and remind Texans about the critical importance of vaccinations, even as there are no reported cases yet in Central Texas, FOX 7 Austin reported.
Amid the resurgence which appears connected to international travel, Austin Public Health is encouraging residents to not be complacent because measles spreads like wildfire in unvaccinated populations, as Dr. Desmar Walkes, Austin-Travis County Health Authority, emphasized, "Vaccination is our best defense against measles and other preventable diseases," and while vaccinations protect individuals they also buttress community health by safeguarding those who can't be immunized due to underlying health issues, according to Austin American-Statesman.com.
Highly infectious, measles is no trifling matter; it has dire side effects and can have serious lifelong complications – in extreme cases, even death – and those at greatest risk include young children, pregnant women, and people with compromised immune systems, whereas simple airborne exposure is enough to put 90% of the non-immune population at risk, "Measles spreads through coughs and sneezes. It can stay in a room for up to two hours" Chief State Epidemiologist Varun Shetty told FOX 7 Austin.
The seeds of this measles reemergence were sown when vaccination rates waned, a fact borne out by numbers showing a precarious dip below the 95% herd immunity threshold in parts of Texas, and while Austin's vaccination rates have hovered close to the mark, health professionals are worried that even a slight drop can erode the protective barrier, providing an opening for measles to spring back into the population, which can have devastating effects as captured by Dr. Edgar Navarro Garza, a pediatrician at Harbor Health, who said, "We've seen those cases after measles or chicken pox with complications in the brain and body," meanwhile, as Texas tackles these new cases, Austin Public Health is presenting affordable vaccination options, offering free or reduced rates for those eligible; appointments can be set up by calling the provided contact number, Austin American-Statesman.com detailed the process for getting vaccinated.
With the shadow of these new cases looming, Texans are urged to review their vaccination status, considering the MMR vaccine is a proven bulwark against this disease: "It's a very, very rare situation when a child should have a medical exemption," Dr. Elizabeth Knapp of the Austin Regional Clinic stressed on the rarity of medical exemptions for the vaccine, underscoring the vaccine's importance and effectiveness, an assertion echoed across the medical community as the best step forward in stamping out further outbreaks.
