Lancaster, Pennsylvania - Amid Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Make America Healthy Again push, authorities in Pennsylvania on Wednesday confirmed a fifth death linked to measles.
Lancaster County health officials confirmed an unvaccinated resident died of the highly contagious disease, but offered no further details.
The region is known for its large Amish population, a traditionalist Christian community that avoids modern society and has lower vaccination rates than the general population.
The outbreak in Pennsylvania has affected 943 patients in 29 counties, state officials said. Across the US, as of September 24, there were 3642 cases reported in 47 states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Measles was declared eradicated in the US in 2000 after years of effective vaccination campaigns. The disease killed hundreds of children every year in the US before a vaccine was developed in the 1960s.
The illness has made a worrying comeback in recent years, however, as vaccine skepticism rose alongside a growing mistrust of health authorities, spurred on by President Donald Trump's vitriol against public health leadership.
Perhaps more significantly, RFK Jr. has repeatedly voiced vaccine skepticism and spread false information about the measles vaccine. He has on multiple occasions downplayed the severity of the life-threatening disease.
Kennedy has also publicly questioned whether some recent deaths were actually caused by the illness, all without providing a shred of evidence. In Pennsylvania, all deaths have occurred in unvaccinated people.
Measles causes fever, respiratory symptoms, and painful rashes. In severe cases, it can trigger complications that include pneumonia and brain inflammation, which can be fatal.
The disease continues to claim tens of thousands of lives around the world every year.