Thread by @Craig_A_Spencer

Today we learned the sad news another kid died from measles in Texas.

We also learned what RFK Jr. will and will not say

And we got a clearer glimpse of the playbook being used to discredit the proven measures to tackle measles outbreaks

Let me tell you why I'm worried 🧵

Let's start with what we know

The death announced today was in an 8 year old girl

The hospital reports she died of 'measles pulmonary failure'

They also report she was unvaccinated

And had no other health conditions

An absolute tragedy. And completely preventable.

Her death was the third measles death in the past few months

And the second in a child

There have been more pediatric deaths from measles in the past 2 months as there have been in the previous 2 decades

This isn't just a coincidence

https://x.com/Craig_A_Spencer/status/1908868046552170691

In 2000, measles was declared eliminated in the United States

There were sporadic importations and some localized flareups

But what we're seeing now is likely just the beginning of bigger, more frequent, and more geographically diverse outbreaks here

h/t @EricTopol

Texas, the epicenter of the current outbreak, has reported nearly 500 cases

And that outbreak has seeded cases in numerous other states, including across the country

According to the Texas Department of Health, 98% of all cases — and all deaths — were in the unvaccinated

Many saw a NYT story this morning about the second measles death

At that time, it hadn't been confirmed by HHS, CDC, or the Texas Department of Health

Apparently, the cause of death was 'still being looked at'

Which reads to me as a way to buy time to control the narrative

But I had heard about it late last night in a Substack post by Dr. Robert Malone

His newsletter has huge reach, going out to over 100,000 subscribers

He's also been a reliable source of misinformation throughout the Covid pandemic
nytimes.com/2022/04/03/tec…

In his post last night, he tells the story of what supposedly happened leading up to this newest measles death

He also shares a LOT of very incorrect medical information, mistruths, and plain out lies

But there's something even more interesting to me about his post...

His post is from 6pm yesterday, 12 hours before the NYT and others wrote about this

He is clearly getting insider and earlier information

He says a 'licensed Texas physician with significant experience treating measles', perhaps the same who has been pushing false treatments

Anti-vaccination groups like Children's Health Defense have been on the ground,

They're talking to parents, trying to discourage vaccination

And pushing dangerous treatments

They've also been pushing their preferred narrative

One that is now killing people

Malone's substack reiterates a lot of it

He uses a lot of fancy medical terms to sound official, and quotes some medical journals

But to anyone trained in this, it is very clearly just a bunch of gobbledygook mixed with dangerous falsehoods

Like what?

Well, he tries to blame her death on anything BUT measles

This is what him and others tried to do with the young girl who died last month as well

He says this patient had 'chronic mononucleosis and chronic tonsillitis' that caused acute sepsis, and that's what took her life

This makes no sense. Like, none.

But he uses words like 'acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS)' and 'gram positive cocci', so who wouldn't believe him??

Those 'gram positive cocci' are bacteria from a severe infection

And the hospital reported she had "pulmonary (lung) failure"...

From measles

Meaning she died of the complications of pneumonia

Why does that matter?

1 in 20 measles infections in kids lead to pneumonia

In fact, pneumonia is the most common cause of death from measles in young children!

cdc.gov/measles/signs-…

He also tries to argue that perhaps things would've been different if only she received nebulizer budesonide

This is a steroid medicine that helps reduce inflammation in the airways

He calls it “clinically proven standard-of-care treatment”

But it isn't for measles

Like azithromycin, zinc, ivermectin and a whole host of other 'cure alls' during Covid, budesonide has become the rallying cry of the anti-vaccination community for measles treatment

In fact, the playbook here is the exact same as during Covid

Instead of talking about the ONE thing we know DOES help lower the risk of contracting and dying from measles — the measles vaccine — they hype up other unproven remedies and demand to receive them once hospitalized

When they don't, they blame malpractice

Wash, rinse, repeat

It gets worse

He goes on to say:

"Measles outbreaks are common, in both vaccinated and unvaccinated regions."

This is such a lazy lie

Do measles outbreaks occur in 'vaccinated regions'?

Yes

BUT ALMOST EXCLUSIVELY AMONGST THE UNVACCINATED

Look again at Texas now...

I'll skip over the other falsehoods to touch on this common refrain:

Kids are dying — not because of measles — but because of medical malpractice

They said the same thing after the first child died of measles

They are saying it again

And they will say it next time too

It is very easy to blame medical professionals for such neglect

Especially for a community that has been primed to distrust doctors during Covid-19

Medical error DOES exist...but it is NOT a third leading cause of death in the U.S.

But the truth doesn't matter to them

Moving on from Malone's misinformation...

Today, RFK Jr broke his silence and fully endorsed measles vaccination as "The most effective way to prevent the spread of measles"

Well, in the third paragraph of an X post, at least

https://x.com/SecKennedy/status/1908967854394982414

In the same post, however, he deliberately added a falsehood

In fact, he edited a falsehood IN to his post AFTER posting it

His edited post included 'the growth rates for news cases and hospitalizations [from measles] has flattened"

Sounds nice

But that just isn't true

Again, he actively edited his post to add in something that is not at all as evident as he claims

We are only catching a fraction of cases

I would imagine there are closer to ~2,000 measles cases in the Texas outbreak

And it continues to seed new outbreaks nationally

So, why does all this matter?

We should certainly take it as a win that RFK Jr has finally endorsed vaccination to prevent measles.

But he MUST do more

Kids are dying of other vaccine-preventable diseases, largely due to his work over decades undermining vaccines

This is all happening at the same time we are actively dismantling our disease detection capacity abroad

And at home

This will dramatically expand our risk of worrisome infectious threats

And our health leadership in this country is NOT up to the task

https://x.com/Craig_A_Spencer/status/1908003978710843408

And as @michaelmina_lab wrote in the NYT a few days ago

As these bubbles of measles cases grow and grow, they will eventually converge

And we could risk a much, much bigger outbreak

And a much bigger threat from measles

We must avoid that at all costs
nytimes.com/2025/04/02/opi…

@michaelmina_lab We are on the edge of multiple health crises

At a time when our health leadership is wavering

At a time when risks are only increasing

This is no time for half-hearted statements and actions

If we don't immediately correct course

We will regret this

END