This week, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a disaster emergency response to an ongoing measles outbreak as New York cases of the virus surge past 100 for the year.
Southern Adirondack Bureau Chief Aaron Shellow-Lavine spoke with University at Albany Clinical Associate Professor Dr. Danielle Wales about the Northeast’s most recent wave of measles.
INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT
Editor's note: this conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
Wales: The biggest thing about this executive order is we're starting to see cases of measles rise in New York State. Measles cases have been accelerating rapidly in Pennsylvania right now, which is right in our back door. And this executive order is going to allow county health departments to respond to cases of measles. It's also going to allow better access for folks who want to get themselves or their children vaccinated to vaccines by expanding the number of providers that can give the vaccine.
Shellow-Lavine: What do you see as the primary drivers behind not only the the cases in New York but also across the Northeast right now?
Wales: Measles is a very tricky virus. It's actually one of the most infectious viruses we know. So, if someone walked into a room full of people with measles, at least 18 would get infected. It's very infectious. It takes just a small amount. It's airborne. It doesn't take much to get infected. It's much more infectious than the flu or COVID or a lot of other viruses, and so when it spreads, it can really spread like wildfire.
Shellow-Lavine: And just so we get them, what are some of the health risks posed by contracting measles?
Wales: The hard part about measles is it really leaves a lot of destruction. It used to be a kind of a disease that people went through childhood with, but thankfully the vaccine has essentially like gotten rid of that, which has been great for our kids. Measles has a tendency to do a lot of things to the body. One-in-five folks who get measles will actually have to be hospitalized, and many of those hospitalizations are due to things like pneumonia. A lot of people don't realize that measles, which we think of as causing a rash, can actually cause a severe pneumonia. People can actually have neurologic deficits. About one-in-10 folks who get measles get ear infections, and sometimes they're left with hearing loss, which will obviously impact them for the rest of their lives. And so, for all these reasons, measles is not just like the common cold. It's not something you just get over. It's something that can have lifelong consequences if you get it.
Shellow-Lavine: Just because you mentioned right at the end there — the common cold — it is flu season. You know, I'm due for my shots. We're seeing measles cases in New York really spike in September, according to the state data, is that typical?
Wales: I think right now it has more to do with the amount of cases overall in the U.S. We're seeing more cases in 2026 than we did last year. Last year was a pretty bad year for measles, but it turns out 2026 is even worse, and we're specifically seeing this in areas where there are pockets of unvaccinated patients, and that's the thing: is once measles gets a foothold, it's very hard to eliminate it. If somebody is vulnerable, they may get it, and that's the importance of making sure everybody is up to date with their vaccine.
Shellow-Lavine: How effective is the measles vaccine?
Wales: It's very good. So one dose is over 90% effective. Two doses is over 97% effective, which is really excellent for these vaccines. And after you have two doses, essentially that is lifelong immunity, which is wonderful. Measles immunity is very persistent over one's lifetime. We typically give kids the vaccine around age one year, and then again around age four. So before they start elementary school, get exposed to other kids.
Shellow-Lavine: I think that you know it's more than fair to say that we're in a moment where vaccine skepticism is well on the rise. As a professor and you know, doctor yourself. How do you deal with that and and approach that as an issue?
Wales: Yeah, we basically had eradicated measles until recently, in the last few years, and parents are really surrounded by a lot of conflicting information right now. And to be honest, it's very hard for parents to to find good sources of information when they pull up their phone and on social media they get bombarded by different opinions and viewpoints that may or not be science based and may be based in the social media influencers' biases or perhaps even worse, by their background and who they're paid for. They might be actually hawking supplements and stuff, and they just see content, but there's no clear no clear you know it's not transparent on why they're getting that content, and so that's a big issue right now for a lot of parents as they're just being bombarded with this, your pediatrician can give you the specifics on why your child would benefit from a vaccine, and that's the best advice I can give anybody — is have that close connection with the pediatrician because you will get personal advice for you and your family from your pediatrician. Or your family doctor.
Shellow-Lavine: We saw a spike in cases in 2025. That was alarming, and then this year, we're seeing even more cases of measles. I don't want to ask you this question as though you've got a crystal ball in front of you, but would you predict this to sort of continue to be a trend or an issue here in the United States?
Wales: You know what? I think my my experience has been that, as a society, we do value our children, and I think we're going to learn from this, and I think we're going to we're going to get stronger from this, and really emphasize the role of public health in protecting our children. I'm very optimistic about that. I do also want to reiterate too that if you're vaccinated, your risk of getting measles is incredibly low. And if you're vaccinated and get measles, you're not going to get those major complications that we talked about. So, if you're vaccinated, if your family is vaccinated, you can breathe easy.
