The U.S. has already logged more measles cases in 2026 than it did in all of 2025, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Five things to know:
- As of July 21, the U.S. has recorded 2,295 confirmed measles cases in 2026, per the Johns Hopkins tracker. In 2025, there were 2,289 measles cases, marking a sharp increase from 285 the year prior, CDC data shows.
- This year’s total represents the highest measles caseload the country has seen since 1991, when 9,643 cases were reported — a 35-year high driven by ongoing, overlapping outbreaks across the nation. The sustained transmission has also put the country’s measles elimination status, first certified in 2000, at risk.
- The resurgence comes amid declining vaccination rates against the disease. National MMR vaccination coverage among kindergartners dropped from 95.2% in the 2019-2020 school year to 92.5% in 2024-2025, according to the CDC, leaving roughly 286,000 kindergartners without protection.
- As of July 17, 93% of confirmed cases involve people who are unvaccinated or have an unknown vaccination status, CDC data shows.
- As of early July, 6% of 2026’s confirmed cases — 138 people — have required hospitalization, down from an 11% hospitalization rate across all of 2025, according to CDC data. No measles deaths have been reported in 2026, compared with three in 2025.
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