US Loses Measles-Elimination Status After Continuous Spread, Health Authorities Reportedly Say

The Pan American Health Organization has revoked the United States' measles-elimination status after 26 years, according to reports citing people with knowledge of the deliberations. The loss means the U.S. is no longer counted as a country where the virus has been eliminated, and it comes as the nation faces its highest measles caseload in more than three decades.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, November 13, 2026, that the Americas branch of the World Health Organization acted because the country did not halt continuous transmission of the highly contagious virus for more than a year. About 7,500 people in the U.S. have been infected and 13 have died since 2025, according to the reporting. PAHO reviewed epidemiological and laboratory evidence to determine whether one strain had circulated uninterrupted for 12 months or longer, a sign of local transmission rather than imported cases. PAHO did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Left-leaning NPR leads with the status loss itself, in a headline saying global health authorities have declared it, and attributes the news to researchers with direct knowledge of PAHO's deliberations. The excerpt available gives no case counts, deaths or political context. The Hindu, in the alternative category, frames it as a report relayed from the Wall Street Journal and Reuters, and supplies the figures, the 26-year timeline and the evaluation method. It also ties the outbreak to falling immunization rates and rising vaccine hesitancy under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who it says has spread doubts without scientific evidence about measles vaccines. Right-leaning outlets had not reported this story at the time of writing, while the left and alternative outlets had. Both covering sides agree on the core fact and that it rests on unnamed sources.