Pennsylvania's Department of Health confirmed Tuesday that two Lancaster County residents died of measles-associated causes. Both were unvaccinated, and officials are withholding further identifying details out of respect for the families. They're the state's first measles deaths in 35 years, and the first anywhere in the U.S. this year. Pennsylvania has logged 393 cases across 28 counties in 2026, most of them in Lancaster County. Nationally, the CDC had confirmed 2,777 cases as of August 20 — the country's worst measles year since it declared the disease eliminated in 2000. A panel is now reviewing whether the U.S. has lost that elimination status altogether, with a final call due in November.

1. HHS's Critics (314 Action's Shaughnessy Naughton, Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, Epidemiologist Tara C. Smith, Columbia's Lucky Tran, CHOP's Dr. Paul Offit)

Kennedy urged this county to resist vaccine mandates. Now it's burying its first measles victims in 35 years.

This isn't a coincidence — it's the same county. In July 2021, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke to roughly 1,500 people, many from Lancaster's Plain community, urging them to resist vaccine mandates and calling measles curable with "chicken soup and vitamin A." Kennedy is now HHS Secretary, and Lancaster County is where the deaths just happened.

More people have died under Kennedy than in the previous 24 years combined. Kent State epidemiologist Tara C. Smith says the U.S. has already had more measles deaths during Kennedy's two years running HHS than it did in the 24 years before that. CHOP's Dr. Paul Offit has accused Kennedy of running "a public relations war against vaccines" meant to scare people off them.

They want him gone. 314 Action's Shaughnessy Naughton asked "how many more people need to die" before there's a nationwide push for Kennedy to resign, calling his record "anti-science, anti-vaccine." Sen. Angela Alsobrooks went further Tuesday, saying Kennedy "must resign or be fired." Columbia's Lucky Tran called the looming loss of elimination status "an abject failure of public health leadership."

2. Kennedy and HHS (Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.)

This is about parents' right to choose, not a federal failure.

Kennedy says he's not the problem. In an August 2 interview — three weeks before the Lancaster deaths — CNN's Dana Bash asked Kennedy whether he accepts responsibility for the rise in measles cases. He said "absolutely not," and insisted he's "never questioned the efficacy of the MMR vaccine."

He frames vaccination as a personal call, not a mandate. Kennedy has said "the decision to vaccinate is a personal one," a line he used during last year's fatal Texas measles outbreak; his August comments to CNN track the same framing.

He offered Pennsylvania help. After the deaths, Kennedy called Gov. Josh Shapiro to offer federal staff for the state's response.

3. Local Lancaster Providers and State Officials (Dr. Pia Fenimore of Lancaster General, Ephrata Mennonite School's Joshua Good, Gov. Josh Shapiro, Dr. Debra Bogen)

This is a trust problem that predates Kennedy, and Washington blame isn't what's fixing it.

Shapiro turned Kennedy's help down. The governor said Pennsylvania's health department could handle its own response, and that he was "very, very blunt" with Kennedy about the damage federal anti-vaccine rhetoric is doing. At a Tuesday press conference, Shapiro said "there's real life consequences to spreading misinformation." Health Secretary Dr. Debra Bogen added that because measles had been largely gone from Pennsylvania for more than three decades, "people are not familiar with this disease and don't fully understand the potential severity of the illness."

The hesitancy isn't doctrinal — it's cultural. Lancaster County's kindergarten vaccination rate was 88.5% as of 2024, well under the roughly 95% needed for herd immunity, and at Ephrata Mennonite School fewer than half of this year's kindergartners are vaccinated. Scholars say there's no theological basis for that in Mennonite teaching. Dr. Pia Fenimore of Lancaster General said the outbreak "is not centered in Amish households" and that views on vaccination vary widely across Plain communities.

What's actually moving the needle is trust, not argument. Ephrata Mennonite's Joshua Good vaccinated his own kids and has spent years trying to convince other families to do the same, with limited luck: "I would get into protracted conversations, trying to persuade people. But the amount of success that I had has been pretty low." Lancaster General's ChildProtect Clinic, running since a 1991 rubella outbreak, has vaccinated roughly 80,000 children by building relationships rather than winning arguments — about 70% of its patients come from Plain communities.

Where This Lands

Kennedy's critics see a straight line from his 2021 rally in this county to this week's deaths, and they're done waiting for him to accept that. Kennedy himself rejects responsibility and frames vaccination as a family's private choice. Pennsylvania's own health officials are running their response without federal help, treating the outbreak as a local trust problem built over a decade, not a crisis Washington can fix by showing up. The U.S. is on track to lose its measles-elimination status this fall, and Lancaster County is the place proving why.

Sources