4 ms·

Here's the origin of the outbreak: > Public health officials say it started when an international traveller attended a wedding in New Brunswick last October. N

by jwgarber 11mo ago

Here's the origin of the outbreak: > Public health officials say it started when an international traveller attended a wedding in New Brunswick last October. New Brunswick's outbreak ended in January, but guests at that wedding had already brought the virus to southwestern Ontario, where that province's outbreak was concentrated among closely knit Mennonite communities. International travel + spread among low-vaccination communities. https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elimination-status-9.6973195?ts=1762789563203 https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/livestory/canada-measles-elim...

buellerbueller 11mo ago
[flagged]
- pclmulqdq 11mo ago
  Historically, these outbreaks have nothing to do with "MAHA"/RFK types. It's religious fundamentalist groups that lack herd immunity (because nobody in the community is vaccinated) every time.
  - truth13told 11mo ago
    [dead]
  - buellerbueller 11mo ago
    These religious fundamentalist groups have always existed, yet Canada and other places eliminated measles. I wonder what changed? Oh yeah, the spread of misinformation on the internet.
    - truth13told 11mo ago
      [dead]
    - delaminator 11mo ago
      [flagged]
      - pseudo0 11mo ago
        Mass immigration from countries where measles is endemic? India has over 10,000 cases per year and makes up the plurality of Canada's immigration intake. Canada has a very high two-shot vaccination rate, but there are pockets like the Mennonite communities that are vulnerable.
        geoka9 11mo ago
        Up-to-date vaccination list is a requirement for immigrant visa in Canada.
        pseudo0 11mo ago
        Only for stays greater than six months. So an unvaccinated person can fly in from wherever and stay for 180 days legally, or just overstay their visa. That's plenty of time to spread measles.
        delaminator 11mo ago
        https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/healthcare/as-the-number-of-fake-doctors-rises-heres-how-to-check-if-yours-is-authentic-19603120.htm https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/healthcare/as-the-number-of-f... 57% of drs are fake, do you think 100% the certificates are genuine?
        eldaisfish 11mo ago
        this is a racist dog whistle. Stop with the "mass immigration" BS. India, contrary to what the racists believe, has a long and successful vaccination program. A country of 1.5 billion people has around a 70% MMR vaccination rate among infants. Canada's in the 80% range and dropping.
        pseudo0 11mo ago
        Canada had eliminated measles, it was reintroduced by travel from a country where measles was endemic. This is not rocket science. High-volume international travel from countries where measles is endemic, like India, poses a public health risk to countries that have eliminated the disease. The same goes for tuberculosis, hepatitis, etc.
    - renewiltord 11mo ago
      What changed was that they were free-riders on the rest of the population and one day the rest of the population no longer met the threshold. One could say it is because of the spread of misinformation and that might be the proximate cause. But if a drug addict periodically overdoses and needs naloxone, and one day a supply chain issue makes it hard to access and he dies, did the supply chain kill him or his drug addiction? Perhaps monocausal explanations are insufficient.
    - koakuma-chan 11mo ago
      [flagged]
    - ch4s3 11mo ago
      It's a little hard to believe that people who famously don't use computers were infected by an "misinformation", a rather loathsome neologism. There was famously a really serious outbreak in the NYC Orthodox community from 1989 to about 1991. Unvaccinated communities are a sort of immunological tinder box, and you never know when a stray spark might land. This is the result of a failure of public health to reach out to these religious communities in effective ways for decades.
      - daveguy 11mo ago
        I think the point was, it's not limited to those isolated groups anymore.
        ch4s3 11mo ago
        It mostly is limited to people in those groups or people in contact with them. [1] The big hot spot in Alberta is the Mennonite community. [1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-mexican-mennonite-measles-vaccine-hesitancy-outreach-1.7601715#:~:text=Vaccine%20coverage%20gaps%20Southern%20Alberta%20has%20945,cent%20in%20the%20City%20of%20Medicine%20Hat. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-mexican-menno...
      - Retric 11mo ago
        That stray spark’s survival is heavily influenced by the herd immunity of the rest of the population. Put another way if the overall population sees an average of 0.5 or 0.95 infections per case there’s zero chance of a huge outbreak. But odds of a case making it to a vulnerable population is wildly higher in the second case.
      - joecool1029 11mo ago
        > There was famously a really serious outbreak in the NYC Orthodox community from 1989 to about 1991. They never really stopped, it's been every few years since then: https://forward.com/news/417390/measles-is-hitting-ultra-orthodox-communities-why-arent-they-vaccinating/ https://forward.com/news/417390/measles-is-hitting-ultra-ort... The Amish are/were undervaccinated but it wasn't due to religious objections. It just seems uncommon in communities to see a dr, unless it's needed: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/ohio-amish-reconsider-vaccines-amid-largest-measles-outbreak-u-s-history https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/ohio-amish-reconsider-va... It's also hard to get an official count (I've seen estimates below 20% vs almost 90% for non-amish communities in same state, but then you read stuff like this which suggests even the old older is above 80% https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article-abstract/128/1/79/30323/Underimmunization-in-Ohio-s-Amish-Parental-Fears?redirectedFrom=fulltext https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article-abstract/128... ) since these communities are grandfathered into their own healthcare systems and often exempt from the normal federal welfare systems: https://www.ssa.gov/faqs/en/questions/KA-02411.html https://www.ssa.gov/faqs/en/questions/KA-02411.html I'm not sure about Mennonites. One of their communities writes about it and seems to suggest only 1 of the 40 or so communities is hardliners against vaccination. But I also note this is written in a really neutral way (could be to placate government, dunno): https://www.mennoniteusa.org/measles/ https://www.mennoniteusa.org/measles/
    - pclmulqdq 11mo ago
      What changed was less funding to the agencies that surveil for disease spread so they can intercept outbreaks. The US CDC funded these programs all over the world.
      - buellerbueller 11mo ago
        And still did until this year. American vaccine hesitancy has grown since long before even covid. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/data-investigation-childhood-vaccination-rates-are-backsliding-us-rcna228876 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/data-investigatio... Just stop sanewashing this.
  - intermerda 11mo ago
    And yet, the parent of one such child who died of measles because of being unvaccinated went on video for Children’s Health Defense (RFK's anti-vaccine group) to claim how vaccines are bad and measles are good. The claim that these the religious fundamentalist groups have nothing to do with anti-vaccine propaganda inflicted by MAHA types is disingenuous or simply poorly informed. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/anti-vaccine-influencers-weaponized-measles-death-texas-rcna196900 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/anti-vaccine-infl...
    - pclmulqdq 11mo ago
      Please go ahead and find me a transmission chain of any of these nearly eradicated infectious diseases that went through someone involved in MAHA or Children's Health Defense. If you go looking, you will find that every single outbreak of Measles, Polio, or any similar disease in North America goes through a fundamentalist religious community. The Wakefield/RFK groups are really not large or tightly-connected enough to do this. What you can blame RFK for (and what you should blame him for) is cutting funding to identify these possible transmission events and intercept them. This is an area where the Trump admin made severe cuts, on the back of RFK's ideological bent against the concept of infectious disease and the "government efficiency" wave. As a result, responses to outbreaks in these religious communities are much, much slower. It is not a "MAHA wave" that is causing outbreaks like this, it's the loss of funding.
      - hombre_fatal 11mo ago
        RFKjr and the 2019 Samoa measles outbreak comes to mind where he went to Samoa to boost vaccine hesitancy after some kids died due to a mistakenly adulterated vaccination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Samoa_measles_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Samoa_measles_outbreak This kind of messaging is why Samoa had 30% vaccination rate while nearby islands had 99% vaccination when measles infected the island later that same year. I don’t see how you can dismiss RFKjr’s messaging. Are you claiming he has no impact on public opinion?
        11mo ago
- giltron 11mo ago
  Alberta now accounts for 38% of the cases https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-measles-status-eliminations-9.6973822 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-measles-statu...
  - gpm 11mo ago
    And 12% of the population for context.
  - red-iron-pine 11mo ago
    Alberta -- just AB -- had more cases than the entire US for some time
canucker2016 11mo ago
from https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/not-surprising-heres-what-drove-canadas-lost-measles-free-status-says-one-expert/ https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/not-surprising-heres-w... Certain religious and cultural groups, including Mennonite populations — where the first outbreak began on Oct. 27, 2024, after an international traveller from Thailand attended a wedding in New Brunswick and guests then returned to southwestern Ontario — and Amish populations, were disproportionately affected.
- canucker2016 11mo ago
  A reporter from The Globe and Mail, Nathan Vanderklippe, did a deep dive into the measles outbreak in New Brunswick/Ontario/Alberta/Texas. see https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbreak-canada-united-states-tracing-the-start/ https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbre... or non-paywalled version https://web.archive.org/web/20250922034906/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbreak-canada-united-states-tracing-the-start/ https://web.archive.org/web/20250922034906/https://www.thegl... or if you want to watch/listen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEU4uTK5abQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEU4uTK5abQ
  - Voultapher 11mo ago
    > Measles, a dangerous illness that for decades has rarely infected Canadians, is back – and spreading. [...] Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., left, now the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, stands with protesters in Olympia, Wash., in 2019, opposing a bill to tighten measles, mumps and rubella vaccine requirements for school-aged children. Reading this, it's a challenge to feel empathy. Everyone deserves some degree of empathy, idiots too. Yet this topic seems so needlessly self inflicted. Maybe it's a more nuanced topic than I'm aware of, is there a strong argument against vaccination?
    - SAI_Peregrinus 11mo ago
      There's a fraudulent argument against vaccination. Unfortunately many people believe the fraudsters.
giarc 11mo ago
The outbreak then spread to Alberta where travelers returned from a wedding in southwestern Ontario. However, there was at least 6 unique entries into Alberta so it wasn't a single outbreak, but in fact, 6 separate outbreaks. Some entered the province following travel to Mexico, again to attend weddings I believe.
DANmode 11mo ago
International travel also implicates the poorly vaccinated - the ones who received the cheaper form of the inoculation.
- ndsipa_pomu 11mo ago
  I had no idea that there were different tiers of inoculation - how does that work? Do the cheaper ones intentionally use the wrong virus or something? Edit: after a brief search, it appears you are mistaken about the efficacy of different measles vaccines - they are all effective.
  - DANmode 11mo ago
    Public health guidance contraindicates live measles vaccines in significantly immunocompromised patients. Live measles vaccines are most commonly used in the most deeply poverty-stricken regions, where nobody is differentiating between the immunocompromised, and the rest of the line of scared people.
    - DANmode 11mo ago
      PS https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/opinion-cdc-vaccine-reversal-exposes-161702182.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/opinion-cdc-vaccine-reve...

buellerbueller 11mo ago

[flagged]

pclmulqdq 11mo ago
Historically, these outbreaks have nothing to do with "MAHA"/RFK types. It's religious fundamentalist groups that lack herd immunity (because nobody in the community is vaccinated) every time.
- truth13told 11mo ago
  [dead]
- buellerbueller 11mo ago
  These religious fundamentalist groups have always existed, yet Canada and other places eliminated measles. I wonder what changed? Oh yeah, the spread of misinformation on the internet.
  - truth13told 11mo ago
    [dead]
  - delaminator 11mo ago
    [flagged]
    - pseudo0 11mo ago
      Mass immigration from countries where measles is endemic? India has over 10,000 cases per year and makes up the plurality of Canada's immigration intake. Canada has a very high two-shot vaccination rate, but there are pockets like the Mennonite communities that are vulnerable.
      - geoka9 11mo ago
        Up-to-date vaccination list is a requirement for immigrant visa in Canada.
        pseudo0 11mo ago
        Only for stays greater than six months. So an unvaccinated person can fly in from wherever and stay for 180 days legally, or just overstay their visa. That's plenty of time to spread measles.
        delaminator 11mo ago
        https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/healthcare/as-the-number-of-fake-doctors-rises-heres-how-to-check-if-yours-is-authentic-19603120.htm https://www.cnbctv18.com/india/healthcare/as-the-number-of-f... 57% of drs are fake, do you think 100% the certificates are genuine?
      - eldaisfish 11mo ago
        this is a racist dog whistle. Stop with the "mass immigration" BS. India, contrary to what the racists believe, has a long and successful vaccination program. A country of 1.5 billion people has around a 70% MMR vaccination rate among infants. Canada's in the 80% range and dropping.
        pseudo0 11mo ago
        Canada had eliminated measles, it was reintroduced by travel from a country where measles was endemic. This is not rocket science. High-volume international travel from countries where measles is endemic, like India, poses a public health risk to countries that have eliminated the disease. The same goes for tuberculosis, hepatitis, etc.
  - renewiltord 11mo ago
    What changed was that they were free-riders on the rest of the population and one day the rest of the population no longer met the threshold. One could say it is because of the spread of misinformation and that might be the proximate cause. But if a drug addict periodically overdoses and needs naloxone, and one day a supply chain issue makes it hard to access and he dies, did the supply chain kill him or his drug addiction? Perhaps monocausal explanations are insufficient.
  - koakuma-chan 11mo ago
    [flagged]
  - ch4s3 11mo ago
    It's a little hard to believe that people who famously don't use computers were infected by an "misinformation", a rather loathsome neologism. There was famously a really serious outbreak in the NYC Orthodox community from 1989 to about 1991. Unvaccinated communities are a sort of immunological tinder box, and you never know when a stray spark might land. This is the result of a failure of public health to reach out to these religious communities in effective ways for decades.
    - daveguy 11mo ago
      I think the point was, it's not limited to those isolated groups anymore.
      - ch4s3 11mo ago
        It mostly is limited to people in those groups or people in contact with them. [1] The big hot spot in Alberta is the Mennonite community. [1] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-mexican-mennonite-measles-vaccine-hesitancy-outreach-1.7601715#:~:text=Vaccine%20coverage%20gaps%20Southern%20Alberta%20has%20945,cent%20in%20the%20City%20of%20Medicine%20Hat. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-mexican-menno...
    - Retric 11mo ago
      That stray spark’s survival is heavily influenced by the herd immunity of the rest of the population. Put another way if the overall population sees an average of 0.5 or 0.95 infections per case there’s zero chance of a huge outbreak. But odds of a case making it to a vulnerable population is wildly higher in the second case.
    - joecool1029 11mo ago
      > There was famously a really serious outbreak in the NYC Orthodox community from 1989 to about 1991. They never really stopped, it's been every few years since then: https://forward.com/news/417390/measles-is-hitting-ultra-orthodox-communities-why-arent-they-vaccinating/ https://forward.com/news/417390/measles-is-hitting-ultra-ort... The Amish are/were undervaccinated but it wasn't due to religious objections. It just seems uncommon in communities to see a dr, unless it's needed: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/ohio-amish-reconsider-vaccines-amid-largest-measles-outbreak-u-s-history https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/ohio-amish-reconsider-va... It's also hard to get an official count (I've seen estimates below 20% vs almost 90% for non-amish communities in same state, but then you read stuff like this which suggests even the old older is above 80% https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article-abstract/128/1/79/30323/Underimmunization-in-Ohio-s-Amish-Parental-Fears?redirectedFrom=fulltext https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article-abstract/128... ) since these communities are grandfathered into their own healthcare systems and often exempt from the normal federal welfare systems: https://www.ssa.gov/faqs/en/questions/KA-02411.html https://www.ssa.gov/faqs/en/questions/KA-02411.html I'm not sure about Mennonites. One of their communities writes about it and seems to suggest only 1 of the 40 or so communities is hardliners against vaccination. But I also note this is written in a really neutral way (could be to placate government, dunno): https://www.mennoniteusa.org/measles/ https://www.mennoniteusa.org/measles/
  - pclmulqdq 11mo ago
    What changed was less funding to the agencies that surveil for disease spread so they can intercept outbreaks. The US CDC funded these programs all over the world.
    - buellerbueller 11mo ago
      And still did until this year. American vaccine hesitancy has grown since long before even covid. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/data-investigation-childhood-vaccination-rates-are-backsliding-us-rcna228876 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/data-investigatio... Just stop sanewashing this.
- intermerda 11mo ago
  And yet, the parent of one such child who died of measles because of being unvaccinated went on video for Children’s Health Defense (RFK's anti-vaccine group) to claim how vaccines are bad and measles are good. The claim that these the religious fundamentalist groups have nothing to do with anti-vaccine propaganda inflicted by MAHA types is disingenuous or simply poorly informed. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/anti-vaccine-influencers-weaponized-measles-death-texas-rcna196900 https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/anti-vaccine-infl...
  - pclmulqdq 11mo ago
    Please go ahead and find me a transmission chain of any of these nearly eradicated infectious diseases that went through someone involved in MAHA or Children's Health Defense. If you go looking, you will find that every single outbreak of Measles, Polio, or any similar disease in North America goes through a fundamentalist religious community. The Wakefield/RFK groups are really not large or tightly-connected enough to do this. What you can blame RFK for (and what you should blame him for) is cutting funding to identify these possible transmission events and intercept them. This is an area where the Trump admin made severe cuts, on the back of RFK's ideological bent against the concept of infectious disease and the "government efficiency" wave. As a result, responses to outbreaks in these religious communities are much, much slower. It is not a "MAHA wave" that is causing outbreaks like this, it's the loss of funding.
    - hombre_fatal 11mo ago
      RFKjr and the 2019 Samoa measles outbreak comes to mind where he went to Samoa to boost vaccine hesitancy after some kids died due to a mistakenly adulterated vaccination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Samoa_measles_outbreak https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Samoa_measles_outbreak This kind of messaging is why Samoa had 30% vaccination rate while nearby islands had 99% vaccination when measles infected the island later that same year. I don’t see how you can dismiss RFKjr’s messaging. Are you claiming he has no impact on public opinion?
      - 11mo ago
giltron 11mo ago
Alberta now accounts for 38% of the cases https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-measles-status-eliminations-9.6973822 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-measles-statu...
- gpm 11mo ago
  And 12% of the population for context.
- red-iron-pine 11mo ago
  Alberta -- just AB -- had more cases than the entire US for some time

canucker2016 11mo ago

from https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/not-surprising-heres-what-drove-canadas-lost-measles-free-status-says-one-expert/ https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/not-surprising-heres-w... Certain religious and cultural groups, including Mennonite populations — where the first outbreak began on Oct. 27, 2024, after an international traveller from Thailand attended a wedding in New Brunswick and guests then returned to southwestern Ontario — and Amish populations, were disproportionately affected.

canucker2016 11mo ago
A reporter from The Globe and Mail, Nathan Vanderklippe, did a deep dive into the measles outbreak in New Brunswick/Ontario/Alberta/Texas. see https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbreak-canada-united-states-tracing-the-start/ https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbre... or non-paywalled version https://web.archive.org/web/20250922034906/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-measles-outbreak-canada-united-states-tracing-the-start/ https://web.archive.org/web/20250922034906/https://www.thegl... or if you want to watch/listen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEU4uTK5abQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEU4uTK5abQ
- Voultapher 11mo ago
  > Measles, a dangerous illness that for decades has rarely infected Canadians, is back – and spreading. [...] Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., left, now the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, stands with protesters in Olympia, Wash., in 2019, opposing a bill to tighten measles, mumps and rubella vaccine requirements for school-aged children. Reading this, it's a challenge to feel empathy. Everyone deserves some degree of empathy, idiots too. Yet this topic seems so needlessly self inflicted. Maybe it's a more nuanced topic than I'm aware of, is there a strong argument against vaccination?
  - SAI_Peregrinus 11mo ago
    There's a fraudulent argument against vaccination. Unfortunately many people believe the fraudsters.

giarc 11mo ago

The outbreak then spread to Alberta where travelers returned from a wedding in southwestern Ontario. However, there was at least 6 unique entries into Alberta so it wasn't a single outbreak, but in fact, 6 separate outbreaks. Some entered the province following travel to Mexico, again to attend weddings I believe.

DANmode 11mo ago

International travel also implicates the poorly vaccinated - the ones who received the cheaper form of the inoculation.

ndsipa_pomu 11mo ago
I had no idea that there were different tiers of inoculation - how does that work? Do the cheaper ones intentionally use the wrong virus or something? Edit: after a brief search, it appears you are mistaken about the efficacy of different measles vaccines - they are all effective.
- DANmode 11mo ago
  Public health guidance contraindicates live measles vaccines in significantly immunocompromised patients. Live measles vaccines are most commonly used in the most deeply poverty-stricken regions, where nobody is differentiating between the immunocompromised, and the rest of the line of scared people.
  - DANmode 11mo ago
    PS https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/opinion-cdc-vaccine-reversal-exposes-161702182.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/opinion-cdc-vaccine-reve...