Michigan health officials confirmed three cases of measles on Thursday. It's the first time since 2019 the state has reported any cases of the highly contagious virus, found most commonly in children.
According to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, symptoms of measles can include: Fevers of up to 104 degrees, coughs, runny noise, red watery eyes, white spots appearing in the mouth and a red rash that spreads across the body.
Robert Root, a pediatrician with Michigan State University Health Care, said the virus's high transmission rate might make people more likely to get vaccinated.
"There is a lot of vaccine hesitancy out there, but it's been the MMR vaccine has been studied vigorously shown to be safe going to be very effective and is a great tool of preventing measles," Root said.
Root also says measles can cause long-term side effects that can be fatal later in life, such as pneumonia, encephalitis (swelling of the brain), and immune amnesia (the immune system forgets how to fight previously encountered diseases).
Sean Valles, director of the Michigan State University Center for Bioethics and Social Justice, said the vaccine has been studied vigorously.
But Valles also said it's hard to convince people who are vaccine hesitant that its safe.
"One thing that we know it doesn't work is just sort of beating people over the head with information and say like, ok, you just need to know more about this," said Valles. "And so read these pamphlets or listen to this speech, and then you'll start making the right decision because of that. And that's just really not the way humans operate."
According to the Centers for Disease Control, a single dose of the MMR vaccine has a 93% success rate against measles, while two doses increase the vaccine's effectiveness to 97%.
Root said the total number of measles cases in the U.S is already higher than the total number of cases in 2023.
