The Texas Department of State Health Services is reporting an outbreak of measles in the South Plains region of Texas. Due to the highly contagious nature of this disease, additional cases are likely to occur in Gaines County and the surrounding communities. DSHS is working with South Plains Public Health District and Lubbock Public Health to investigate the outbreak.
And even more concerning, is that the latest measles case count likely represents only a fraction of the true number of infections. Health officials suspect 200 to 300 people in West Texas are infected but untested, and therefore not part of the state’s official tally so far.
The outbreak is in a sparsely populated swath of rural Texas, near the New Mexico border, and has spread from its epicenter in Gaines County to include single-digit cases in Lynn, Terry and Yoakum counties. The cases have been concentrated in a “close-knit, undervaccinated” Mennonite community, Texas Department of State Health Services spokesperson Lara Anton said. Gaines County is highly rural, so many of the families send their children to small private schools or are homeschooled, Anton said.
Measles cases were limited to rural areas surrounding Lubbock, Texas, the largest city in the region, until February 14th, when Lubbock Public Health confirmed its first case. People who live in Gaines County regularly head into Lubbock to shop and do other business. That includes a large number of unvaccinated people who may have been exposed to measles.
“Communities who don’t vaccinate are not necessarily isolated to their area. They commute to Lubbock,” said Dr. Ana Montanez, a pediatrician at Texas Tech Physicians in Lubbock. “By doing that, they’re taking the disease with them.”
Several of Montanez’s young patients were exposed recently, she said, one just by sitting in the same clinic waiting room with another child who was later confirmed to have measles. That child had traveled from another county for care.
On March 6th, the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) created an outbreak case definition, expanded the number of counties included in the outbreak area, and reiterated recommendations for immunization within that area. This case definition defines the outbreak area as the following six counties (Dawson, Gaines, Lynn, Martin, Terry, and Yoakum), extending immunization recommendations to that area. The geographic area considered as part of the outbreak will be evaluated on an ongoing basis and can be adjusted when there is enough epidemiologic evidence to support this.
Those include considering an early dose of MMR vaccine for infants ages 6 to 11 months and a second dose for adults who have received only one. It also expands the definition of an epidemiologically linked confirmed case to include patients with a fever and rash who live in or have visited the outbreak area in the last 21 days.
After first appearing in the rural South Plains region of Texas, the outbreak spread across the border into Lea County, New Mexico; that has now spread to neighboring Eddy County in New Mexico and has even jumped hundreds of miles into the Texas Panhandle and Northeast Texas. Cases then appeared in the northeastern part of Oklahoma in mid-March.
On March 26th, the Kansas Department of Health and Environment announced a possible link between the state's growing outbreak and the ongoing outbreak in Texas. “The confirmed cases in Kansas have a possible link to the outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico. While genetic sequencing of the first Kansas case reported is consistent with an epidemiological link to the Texas and New Mexico outbreaks, the source of exposure is still unknown,” according to Jill Bronaugh, communications director for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
“This is going to be a large outbreak, and we are still on the side where we are increasing the number of cases,” said Katherine Wells, director of Lubbock Public Health, at a briefing Tuesday; “I’m really thinking this is going to be a year long.”
However, officials say that increased testing capacity will be helpful in containing the outbreak. Labs have been set up in Lubbock, close to the epicenter of the outbreak. This means specimens no longer need to be sent via plane to Austin, reducing the time to get results from 72 hours to the same day.
But with its measles outbreak spreading to two additional states, Texas is now on track to becoming the cause of a national epidemic if it doesn’t start vaccinating more people, according to public health experts. After resurfacing in rural West Texas communities, it jumped hundreds of miles to the northern border of the Panhandle and East Texas, and also invaded bordering states of New Mexico and Oklahoma.
With cases continuously rising and the rest of the country’s unvaccinated population at the outbreak’s mercy, Texas must create stricter quarantine requirements, increase the vaccine rate, and improve contact tracing to address this measles epidemic before it becomes a nationwide problem, warn infectious disease experts and officials in other states.
“This demonstrates that this (vaccine exemption) policy puts the community, the county, and surrounding states at risk because of how contagious this disease is,” said Glenn Fennelly, a specialist in pediatric infectious diseases and chair of the Department of Pediatrics at Texas Tech University. “We are running the risk of threatening global stability.”
The CDC has been assisting efforts on the ground in Texas, and Dr. Philip Huang, director of Dallas County Health and Human Services, says local efforts are “dependent” on federal support.
“Our staffing to be able to do vaccination clinics and our epidemiology staff to do the investigations and contact tracing … so much of that is federally funded that we are very dependent on and very concerned about some of the potential staffing cuts that we’re seeing at the federal level, as well as some of the budget cuts,” he said Tuesday.
After the first measles death in late February, HHS Secretary RFK Jr began pushing various disproven remedies to prevent and cure measles, such as Vitamin A and Cod Liver Oil. He published an opinion piece on Fox News in early March stating that "Vitamin A can drastically reduce measles mortality". The CDC has stated that Vitamin A can be used under supervision of a doctor for supportive care of hospitalized individuals with measles.
A USA Today article published on April 4th reported that multiple children have been treated due to Vitamin A toxicity.
Hospital officials from Covenant Children's Hospital in Lubbock have confirmed that recently multiple children from West Texas have been treated for Vitamin A toxicity, but declined to state how many, instead stating that there were "fewer than 10 cases."
The children were initially hospitalized due to measles complications. They underwent routine lab testing, which showed abnormal liver function believed to be caused by vitamin A toxicity, according to Dr. Lara Johnson, a pediatric hospitalist and chief medical officer of the Covenant Health-Lubbock service area. “Some patients reported using vitamin A for both treatment and prevention of measles,” Johnson said in a statement on March 27.
"Evidence on vitamin A treatment should not be extended to prevention. Vitamin A supplements will not prevent people from getting measles, vaccination does that," Dr. Christopher R. Sudfeld, the author of the study that RFK Jr inaccurately referenced, said in March. Doctors and health officials also warned that vitamin A can cause toxicity if administered in excess at home
On February 11, 2025 the New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) reported a confirmed case of measles in Lea County. The unvaccinated teenager with no recent travel or exposure to known cases from the Texas outbreak. On February 14th, the NMDOH reported that two adult residents of Lea County tested positive for measles, thus declaring a measles outbreak, based on the CDC's criteria of three unrelated cases in Lea County.
The New Mexico Department of Health launched a online state measles resource on February 28th to provide guidance and information on the outbreak.
On March 6, a Lea County resident was found to have measles upon death. Following this news a sharp rise in cases followed, with cases jumping from 9 to 30 on March 7th. The increase in case numbers reflects test results from the NMDOH Scientific Laboratory Division combined with cases discovered during epidemiologic investigations of known patients. These cases did not occur simultaneously, but were identified retrospectively, with many detected only after patients had already recovered from their illness.
The deceased, an unvaccinated Lea County adult, tested positive for measles after death and did not seek medical care before passing, according to laboratory confirmation from the NMDOH Scientific Laboratory Division, though the official cause of death remains under investigation by the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator.
While initially the outbreak in Lea County was not found be tied to the outbreak in West Texas, health officials now consider it to be linked and a part of the larger regional outbreak that has now included nine counties in Texas, two counties in New Mexico, and most recently, two Oklahoma residents.
The Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) first reported two measles cases, linked to the ongoing outbreak in Texas and New Mexico, on March 11, 2025. The cases are being reported to the CDC as probable cases based on the facts that the individuals had reported exposure associated with the Texas and New Mexico outbreak and were reportedly experiencing symptoms consistent with measles. After realizing they had been exposed to measles, the individuals took the proper precautions by immediately excluding themselves from public settings and staying home throughout their contagious period.
On March 14th, the OSDH received notification of two additional probable cases, and immediately began investigation. Through the investigation, the OSDH learned the individuals were in public settings while contagious, creating a potential risk to the public. Both cases reported exposure associated with the Texas and New Mexico outbreak. Their initial exposure was not from the two individuals announced on March 11, 2025.
On March 25th the OSDH provided an update that there were now 9 cases (7 confirmed, 2 probable) in the northeastern part of the state. The first four cases were linked to the Texas outbreak while the remaining are linked to household or extended family exposures. OSDH said it worked with the Cherokee Nation, health care community and Tulsa Health Department to “complete the necessary steps” when measles cases were identified.
The Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) has launched a centralized location for measles updates at Oklahoma.gov/health/measles.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) first reported measles cases in early February in Stevens County, but in early March cases began to take off, with cases doubling weekly and spreading to multiple counties in the southwestern part of the state. Between March 21st and March 26th the number of cases jumped from 10 to 23.
On March 26th, the KDHE announced that they were investigating a possible link to the broader outbreak whose epicenter is in Gaines County, Texas, approximately 375 miles away.
“The confirmed cases in Kansas have a possible link to the outbreaks in Texas and New Mexico,” said Jill Bronaugh, communications director for the KDHE. “While genetic sequencing of the first Kansas case reported is consistent with an epidemiological link to the Texas and New Mexico outbreaks, the source of exposure is still unknown.”
As of April 22, 2025, there have been a total of 702 cases associated with this outbreak. The outbreak currently involves at least 3 states and at least 35 counties. The majority (96.0%) of cases were unvaccinated or had unknown vaccination status. A total of 70 (10.0%) cases have be hospitalized, and there have been three deaths associated with this outbreak.
Note: While the outbreak in Kansas has a genetic link to this outbreak, health officials have yet to identify a source, thus their cases are not currently included in these totals.
Location |
Cases |
Percentage (by state) |
|---|---|---|
| Texas | 624 | 88.9% of Outbreak |
| Andrews County, TX | 2 | 0.3% |
| Bailey County, TX | 2 | 0.3% |
| Borden County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Brown County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Cochran County, TX | 12 | 1.9% |
| Dallum County, TX | 7 | 1.1% |
| Dawson County, TX | 23 | 3.7% |
| Ector County, TX | 10 | 1.6% |
| El Paso County, TX | 20 | 3.2% |
| Erath County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Gaines County, TX | 386 | 61.9% |
| Garza County, TX | 2 | 0.3% |
| Hale County, TX0 | 5 | 0.8% |
| Hockley County, TX | 5 | 0.8% |
| Lamar County, TX | 11 | 1.8% |
| Lamb County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Lubbock County, TX | 47 | 7.5% |
| Lynn County, TX | 2 | 0.3% |
| Martin County, TX | 3 | 0.5% |
| Midland County, TX | 3 | 0.5% |
| Parmer County, TX | 4 | 0.6% |
| Potter County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Randall County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Reeves County, TX | 1 | 0.2% |
| Terry County, TX | 54 | 8.7% |
| Yoakum County, TX | 19 | 3.0% |
| New Mexico | 65 | 9.3% of Outbreak |
| Chaves County, NM | 1 | 1.5% |
| Eddy County, NM | 2 | 3.1% |
| Lea County, NM | 61 | 93.8% |
| Doña Ana County, NM | 1 | 1.5% |
| Oklahoma | 13 | 1.9% of Outbreak |
| Cleveland County, OK | 1 | 7.7% |
| Custer County, OK | 1 | 7.7% |
| Oklahoma County, OK | 2 | 15.4% |
| Tulsa County, OK | 9 | 69.2% |
| Total Cases | 702 |
Age Range |
Cases |
Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Texas | ||
| 0-4 years | 186 | 29.8% |
| 5-17 years | 236 | 37.8% |
| 18+ years | 178 | 28.5% |
| Pending | 24 | 3.8% |
| New Mexico | ||
| 0-4 years | 18 | 27.7% |
| 5-15 years | 19 | 29.2% |
| 18+ years | 28 | 43.1% |
| Pending | 0 | 0.0% |
| Oklahoma | ||
| 0-4 years | ||
| 5-17 years | ||
| 18+ years | ||
| Undisclosed | 13 | 100.0% |
| Total Cases | ||
| 0-4 years | 204 | 29.1% |
| 5-17 years | 255 | 36.3% |
| 18+ years | 206 | 29.3% |
| Pending | 37 | 5.3% |
| Undisclosed | 13 | 1.9% |
Vaccination Status |
Cases |
Percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Texas | ||
| Unvaccinated or Unknown Status | 602 | 96.5% |
| One MMR Dose | 10 | 1.6% |
| Two MMR Doses | 12 | 1.9% |
| New Mexico | ||
| Unvaccinated | 47 | 72.3% |
| At least One MMR Dose | 6 | 9.5% |
| Unknown Status | 12 | 18.5% |
| Oklahoma | ||
| Unvaccinated or Unknown Status | 13 | 100% |
| One MMR Dose | 0 | 0% |
| Two MMR Doses | 0 | 0% |
| Total Cases | ||
| Unvaccinated or Unknown Status | 674 | 96.0% |
| (At least) One MMR Dose | 16 | 2.3% |
| Two MMR Doses | 12 | 1.7% |
Updates posted Tuesdays and Fridays.
| County | Cases |
|---|---|
| Andrews | 2 |
| Bailey | 2 |
| Borden | 1 |
| Brown | 1 |
| Cochran | 12 |
| Dallum | 7 |
| Dawson | 23 |
| Ector | 10 |
| El Paso | 20 |
| Erath | 1 |
| Gaines | 386 |
| Garza | 2 |
| Hale | 5 |
| Hockley | 5 |
| Lamar | 11 |
| Lamb | 1 |
| Lubbock | 47 |
| Lynn | 2 |
| Martin | 3 |
| Midland | 3 |
| Parmer | 4 |
| Potter | 1 |
| Randall | 1 |
| Reeves | 1 |
| Terry | 54 |
| Yoakum | 19 |
| Total | 624 |
| Age Range | Case Count |
| 0 - 4 Years Old | 186 |
| 5 - 17 Years Old | 236 |
| 18+ Years Old | 178 |
| Pending | 24 |
| Vaccination Status | Case Count |
| Unvaccinated or Unknown Vaccination Status | 602 |
| One MMR Dose | 10 |
| Two MMR Doses | 12 |
We will post updates on Tuesdays and Fridays by noon Mountain Standard Time if there are new cases to report.
| County | Case Count | Hospitalizations | Deaths |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chaves | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Eddy | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Lea | 61 | 5 | 1 |
| Doña Ana | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Total | 65 | 6 | 1 |
| Age Range | Cases |
|---|---|
| 0 - 4 year | 18 |
| 5 - 17 years | 19 |
| 18+ years | 28 |
| Pending | 0 |
| Vaccination Status | Case Count |
|---|---|
| Not Vaccinated | 47 |
| At least one MMR dose | 6 |
| Unknown vaccination status | 12 |
Exposure notifications will be posted as they are identified. The case summary information will be updated on Tuesdays and Fridays at noon.
| Total Cases | 13 |
|---|---|
| Probable | 3 |
| Confirmed | 10 |
| Hospitalizations | 0 |
| Deaths | 0 |
| Vaccination Status | |
| Unvaccinated or Unknown Status | 13 |
| One MMR Dose | 0 |
| Two MMR Doses | 0 |
Exposures in the past 42 days (since 3/11/2025).
Further details about specific exposures can be found here.
Location |
Dates |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| County | City | Week Reported | Exposure Date |
| Custer | Weatherford | 3/30/25 - 4/5/25 | 3/19/2025 |
| Oklahoma | Oklahoma City | 3/30/25 - 4/5/25 | 3/23/2025 |
| Oklahoma | Oklahoma City | 4/6/25 - 4/12/25 | 4/6/2025 |
| Cleveland | Norman | 4/13/25 - 4/19/25 | 4/14/2025 |
| Cleveland | Slaughterville | 4/13/25 - 4/19/25 | 4/15/25 |
This dashboard will be updated every Wednesday. Data is provisional and may change as cases are investigated by public health.
As of April 23, 2025, there have been a total of 37 measles cases in 8 counties in Kansas. There has been one hospitalization.
| County | Case Count* |
|---|---|
| Finney | 1-5 |
| Ford | 1-5 |
| Grant | 1-5 |
| Gray | 1-5 |
| Haskwell | 8 |
| Kiowa | 6 |
| Morton | 1-5 |
| Stevens | 7 |
| Total | 37 |
*When there are fewer than 6 reported cases in a county, the exact number is not shown - instead a range of 1-5 is displayed. This practice helps protect the privacy of individual patients by ensuring that very small case numbers, which could potentially identify someone, remain confidential.
| Age Range | Cases |
|---|---|
| 0-4 years | 11 |
| 5-17 years | 19 |
| 18+ years | 7 |
| Pending | 0 |
| Vaccination Status | Cases |
|---|---|
| Age-Appropriate Vaccination | 4 |
| Not Age-Appropriate Vaccination | 1 |
| Not Vaccinated | 30 |
| Pending Verification | 0 |
| Unable to Verify | 2 |
The following defines how vaccination status is defined for each case.
