What you should know about measles: MU doctor shares info after CDC alert

Measles, a disease more contagious than the flu or COVID, is on the rise in the United States, with one case in Missouri.

Vaccination protects children from the disease, but vaccinations are declining, said Amruta Padhye, a pediatric infectious disease doctor at the University of Missouri.

She spoke in a Zoom call Wednesday with reporters after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a health advisory this week.

The 58 total cases so far is more than was reported in all of 2023. Fifty-four were connected to international travel and most were in children 12 months or older who had not been vaccinated.

The Clay County Public Health Center on Jan. 12 provided a news release about a confirmed measles case there. A Liberty resident had been to the Kansas City International Airport and North Kansas City Hospital.

Measles, before the vaccine was available, was a leading cause of hospitalizations, with many deaths associated with it, Padhye said. Before 1963, measles was responsible for 40,000 hospitalizations annually and 500 deaths. The vaccine has reduced that by 99%.

Now about one in five measles cases require hospitalization. It can cause ear infections, diarrhea and pneumonia. Very rarely, there is brain inflammation and death.

There's another complication of the disease, she said.

"One important thing that I think should be known is that after measles infection, a person has failure of their immune system and kind of gets what we call immune amnesia, meaning the body forgets to respond to future infections in a way that they would have previously done," she said. "They're no longer able to fight off other infections because their immune response is blunted."

Measles is very contagious, Padhye said.

"Measles, by far is one of the more contagious diseases," Padhye said. "It's more contagious than influenza or COVID-19, where nine out of 10 susceptible people who are exposed to one person with Measles can get that infection."

Those who are unvaccinated are susceptible, she said.

It can be caught through respiratory droplets from coughs or sneezes of an infected person, but it can also linger in the air of a room for several hours after an infected person has left, she said.

Initial symptoms can include a runny nose, fever, cough or pink eye. A head-to-toe rash occurs about four days in, spreading from the center of the child's body outward.

"That should be a big clue to parents to have their child evaluated, to reach out to a doctor," Padhye said.

When do babies get vaccinated for measles?

Children between 12 and 15 months should get their first dose of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine, with a second dose administered before the child starts kindergarten.

The advice changes for a child who will be traveling outside of the country, Padhye said. The first dose should be administered between 6 and 11 months, with the second dose at 12 months, with the doses at least four weeks apart.

"We know that vaccine hesitancy in the recent years has increased," Padhye said. "During COVID, that became more evident, not with COVID vaccinations, but also with persons refusing even prior routine immunizations."

She encourages those who are hesitant to discuss the pros and cons with their doctors.

If one person with measles is surrounded by people who are all vaccinated, the transmission stops, she said.

The vaccine is a live attenuated vaccine, a modified form of the virus for mumps, measles and rubella that trains the immune system. A person can't catch the diseases from the vaccine.

Children who get the vaccine can get a rash and a fever six to 12 days after it's administered, Padhye said.

"Being frank with families about the benefits of the vaccine, that it's safe and the side effects to watch for, is important," she said.

Measles is almost entirely preventable through vaccination, the CDC states. It was declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000.

Roger McKinney is the Tribune's education reporter. You can reach him at rmckinney@columbiatribune.com or 573-815-1719. He's on X at @rmckinney9.

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: After CDC's measles alert, MU doctor shares symptoms, MMR vaccine info