Key facts
- PAHO revoked the US measles-elimination status after 26 years, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
- PAHO did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment on the report.
- PAHO reviewed epidemiological and laboratory evidence to determine whether the same measles strain circulated in the US uninterrupted for 12 months or longer.
- Some 7,500 people in the US were infected with measles and 13 died since 2025, the report said.
- Two doses of the measles vaccine provide 97% protection, the report said; a country can halt transmission when 95% of its population is vaccinated.
The Pan American Health Organization has revoked the United States' measles-elimination status after 26 years, the Wall Street Journal reported on November 13, citing people familiar with the matter. The US did not halt continuous transmission of the virus for more than a year, the report said. PAHO, the Americas branch of the World Health Organization, did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
The reported decision comes as the US records its highest measles case count in more than three decades. As of Thursday, 5,182 confirmed cases had been reported in 2026 to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 45 states, New York City and the District of Columbia, surpassing last year's total of 2,289. Some 7,500 people in the US have been infected and 13 have died since 2025, the report said, a period that coincides with falling immunization rates and rising vaccine hesitancy under US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has for years spread doubts, without scientific evidence, about the safety of measles vaccines.
As part of its evaluation, PAHO reviewed epidemiological and laboratory evidence to determine whether the same strain of measles had circulated in the United States uninterrupted for 12 months or longer, a sign of local transmission rather than imported cases. The US achieved elimination status in 2000. A country can halt transmission when 95% of its population is vaccinated, creating herd immunity that also protects those unable to receive the vaccine. Two doses of the measles vaccine provide 97% protection against the virus, which can cause blindness, deafness, brain damage or death, the report said.