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NYC mayor Bill de Blasio declared a public health emergency in Brooklyn this week, where measles has infected 285 people since last fall. It’s not the first time this year that authorities have imposed strict measures meant to curb a measles outbreak 1/ wired.trib.al/0BDSe7z
There’s not a lot of precedent for these more extreme measures (which raise questions of legality), but New York health officials only took such actions after a bunch of other strategies failed to contain the outbreaks. 2/ wired.trib.al/0BDSe7z 
Unlike in Europe, where 11 countries have had to put compulsory vaccination policies in place, Americans have been mostly willing public health participants. Over the last decade though, many states have made it easier for parents to get personal exemptions for vaccinations. 3/
As a result, more kids are going unvaccinated. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that 2018 was the third year that exemptions have increased. 4/ wired.trib.al/UO5OgZp
When measles became a largely hypothetical disease, the 1 in a million chance of allergic reaction to a vaccine started to sound a lot scarier. Measles is not so hypothetical anymore. 5/ wired.trib.al/9upzpiX
Among airborne respiratory pathogens, measles is an elite virus—the most contagious disease known to humans. A cough from an infected person on a subway car would spread the disease to 90 out of 100 unprotected people. 6/ wired.trib.al/TwaBjSM
Only recently does the threat of bigger outbreaks appear to be tipping the scales. At least eight states, including some that experienced measles spikes this year, are now taking a harder look at their lax personal exemption laws. 7/ wired.trib.al/0BDSe7z
The good news is that laws work. When California got rid of personal belief exemptions in 2015, only 90.4% of kindergartners in public schools were immunized. In the 2017-18 school year, 95.1% of kindergartners had all their immunizations. 8/ wired.trib.al/0BDSe7z
The bad news? California is one of only three states to have such requirements. But with a string of recent outbreaks, it looks like that may be changing. Read more here: 9/ wired.trib.al/0BDSe7z
