'This doesn’t have to keep happening': WSJ editorial board begs Trump ally to change

A measles outbreak in Texas prompted the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board to issue an urgent plea to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist and the nation's new secretary of Health and Human Services.

As of Monday, 48 cases of measles have been confirmed in Texas, doubling in a matter of days. Gaines County appears to be the epicenter with 42 cases, and all cases have been reported in unvaccinated people or those with unknown vaccination status.

Thirteen have been hospitalized.

Elsewhere, New Mexico reported 3 unrelated cases in a county bordering Texas, and federal health officials have confirmed 14 cases across a handful of other states: Alaska, Georgia, New York and Rhode Island.

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The Journal's editorial board highlighted the crisis stems from one that was all but eliminated at the turn of the century.

"The tragedy is that this doesn’t have to keep happening," wrote the board, adding that immunizations saved millions around the world since becoming available more than 60 years ago.

"The peril isn’t small," the editorial said — about about 1 in 5 unvaccinated people in the U.S. who get measles become hospitalized. about 1 to 3 of every 1,000 children who contract measles don't survive.

"Yet for some people, the reality of measles feels like a sepia-toned history lesson, whereas the antivax hooey featured on podcasts these days sounds current," the board said. "RFK Jr., an environmental lawyer by trade, has long been part of the problem, and at his Senate confirmation hearings he presented himself as just asking questions, man. That undersells his role in spreading doubt and confusion."

Key to curbing the number of infections is restoring confidence in vaccines — a hard sell from someone who's spent years doing the opposite.

"This is courting heartache that parents used to face routinely but that modern medicine has made unthinkable for most. We are on record as skeptical of RFK Jr.’s nomination. The Senate confirmed him. Now the best-case scenario would be for Mr. Kennedy to internalize that he is no longer an activist outsider who needs to take provocative potshots to get attention," the Journal wrote.

"He’s the nation’s health secretary, and there are children in the hospital with measles who shouldn’t have to be there," the board concluded.