United States: When West Texas and eastern New Mexico started experiencing measles outbreaks, Dr. Hector Ocaranza realized El Paso would face its own outbreak.
His border city is connected by highways to the Texas epicenter, where they have recorded up to 663 cases.
Thousands of families, along with commercial truckers, drive these same roads when they cross between Mexico and the United States each day.
As Ocaranza, El Paso’s top public health doctor, mentioned, “Diseases know no borders, “so as people are mobile, they’re going to be coming and receiving medical attention in El Paso, but they may be living in Juarez.”
Rising Measles in El Paso
El Paso has become the Texas location with the biggest number of measles cases outside West Texas after documenting 38 instances.
New cases are on the rise in Ciudad Juarez, with 14 confirmed patients as the city tally reported on Monday, as AP News reported.
Three people have died from measles in the United States, and one individual succumbed to the disease in Mexico as more than 2,500 North American residents got infected.
Measles Jumps borders
Measles began spreading in Ontario, Canada, in the autumn and later resumed in late January in Texas and New Mexico. This was followed by a quick expansion in Chihuahua State starting in mid-February, which reached 786 cases.
Several outbreaks occurred in locations where residents of distinct Mennonite Christian communities have migrated generationally from their Canadian origin to Mexico and finally settled in Seminole, Texas.
#NorthAmerica's three biggest #measles outbreaks continue to balloon, with more than 2,500 known cases; three people have died in the #US and one in #Mexico https://t.co/cijFK6tD3s
— Arab News (@arabnews) May 1, 2025
The initial Mennonite child acquired measles after traveling to Seminole before transmitting it to their schoolmates, as documented by officials from Chihuahua.
The Ontario outbreak was initiated after Mennonite members met at a New Brunswick gathering, as AP News reported.
“This virus was imported, traveling country to country,” as per Leticia Ruíz, director of prevention and disease control in Chihuahua.
The Director of the Pan American Health Organization, Dr. Jarbas Barbosa, announced that nations across North and South America have faced difficulties in sustaining a 95% measles vaccination coverage, which serves as a protection against new outbreaks.
A recent World Health Organization report confirms that measles activity in the Americas has surged eleven times higher than last year, while the current risk level is rated as high in comparison to the rest of the world’s moderate rating.