Dr. Paul Offit, a pediatric infectious-disease specialist at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, told The Independent on Tuesday, "I've lost trust in the CDC." [1] He was answering a documented federal action, not a mood. Pennsylvania reported two measles-associated deaths. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention then excluded both from its national dashboard. [1] [2] Offit called the response an attempt "to downplay the instance of measles and to downplay the measles deaths in that county," and said he believes it has been political. [1]
Monday this paper reported that the CDC dropped both Pennsylvania deaths from the national count while Lancaster's coroner opened a second investigation without determining cause. That remains the documentary position. Exclusion is an action. It is not a finding that the deaths were invented. Tuesday the clinicians this paper held for a same-day interview said so on the record, and Ars Technica, citing the New York Times, reported that the second death was a child. [2] Both were unvaccinated Lancaster County residents. [1] [2]
The Washington Post's reconstruction, cited by Ars, is mechanical. On August 29 at 2:33 p.m. Eastern, the CDC chart listed 2026 measles deaths as 0. On August 30 at 12:09 p.m., the chart read 2, with a note that health departments make death determinations and share them with CDC. By 3:23 p.m. the same day the two deaths were gone, replaced by an asterisk pointing to a statement that available information "does not establish whether measles caused or contributed to the deaths or whether the individuals died from other causes while infected with measles." [2] The asterisk remained as of Tuesday. [2] CDC Director Erica Schwartz, less than a month in the job, ordered the unusual statement onto the surveillance page, the Times reported. [2]
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had already suggested Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro's office "fabricated" the reports. [1] Lancaster County Commissioner Josh Parsons treated Coroner Stephen Diamantoni's spleen finding on the newborn as proof the state's announcement was deception. [1] Diamantoni has said a forensic pathologist found a ruptured spleen, not enlarged or inflamed, and did not tie the laceration to measles. [1] Offit called the leap from that finding to "measles is not the cause" absurd. [1] Measles can enlarge a spleen and thin the tissue around it; after rupture it can be hard to tell whether the organ was previously enlarged. [2] A ruptured spleen in a newborn is extremely rare. [2] Offit told reporters he has been in touch with state officials and that "these patients would not have died were it not for measles." [2]
Dr. Deb Houry, CDC chief medical officer under Trump until she resigned last August, told The Independent the process should not change by the color of a state. [1] The CDC did not question reported measles deaths in Texas or New Mexico last year. [1] "Whether you live in a blue, purple, or red state, the process and the collaboration should be the same. And the big picture is being lost — two people died." [1] Dr. Amesh Adalja, a Pittsburgh infectious-disease physician, said he was "not surprised that CDC official statistics are the way they are," because Kennedy "has thoroughly remade" the agency "in his image." [1] Two deaths among confirmed cases, he said, imply the confirmed count is a fraction of the real one. [1]
CDC spokesperson Grace Davis Jamison told The Independent the deaths "have not been confirmed based on the information currently available to CDC." [1] The dashboard that shows no U.S. measles deaths, she said, "reflects the best available information." [1] Pennsylvania's health department said it has "provided all required epidemiological data to the CDC regarding the two measles-associated deaths." [1] The Independent cited 460 measles cases in Pennsylvania. [1] Do not fold that figure into other ledgers. An Annenberg poll published Monday found Americans still trust their own doctors at 87 percent while confidence in the CDC has fallen. Offit's sentence is that split spoken by a clinician who used to assume the dashboard was the science. The dashboard, as of Tuesday, still carries an asterisk where two deaths were.
-- NORA WHITFIELD, Chicago