Rockland County’s measles outbreak officially ended Tuesday, a few weeks after a similar public-health win in Williamsburg. Credit the Legislature and local governments for taking the tough steps to make this possible.
By going six weeks (two incubation periods) with no new measles case, Rockland met the World Health Organization standard for ending the outbreak. If it hadn’t ended by Oct. 1, the United States would’ve lost the “measles-free” status it’s had for years.
The United Kingdom and three other European nations lost that status this year. The global problem is largely the result of a severe outbreak in Israel — with other countries then finding the crisis hard to contain thanks to years of anti-vaccine misinformation.
Measles is one of the most contagious human diseases: The virus can survive in the air or on surfaces for up to two hours; carriers often show no symptoms for a good period, during which they can unwittingly spread the virus to others — and the disease can be deadly in children.
The 1,241 US measles cases this year were more than the country had seen since 1992; in the years since then, the disease was eradicated in this country. That made it easier for parents to avoid a seemingly needless vaccination for their kids — with anti-vaxxers giving them reason to do so.
Tens of thousands of New York kids were unvaccinated when the outbreaks hit, and the public-health response was slowed by laws that made it easy to claim a “religious exemption” to vaccination mandates.
While wiser heads in Jewish communities worked to counter anti-vax propaganda and Rockland and the city enforced quarantines, state lawmakers (after several false starts) removed all non-medical exemptions from school vaccinations.
It took a full-court press, but New York got it done. Excelsior!