Reprinted with permission of Alabama Reflector
Alabama’s public health director said Thursday that public health officials were “doing everything possible to prepare” for measles as the highly-contagious disease spreads through the country.
“We’re educating providers and sending out information to health care facilities and individual providers so that they can look for it and recognize it,” said Dr. Scott Harris, the State Health Officer, at a meeting of the Alabama Department of Public Health.
Harris said that the state has the ability to test for measles, which it has not done before because there has not been a high demand for testing.
“We’ve got the ability to do our own measles testing now here in-state, which is a much quicker turnaround than having to send it out,” Harris said.
Through Feb. 13, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported nearly 1,000 confirmed cases of the disease. Two-thirds of the confirmed cases this year are in South Carolina, most in people who are unvaccinated, according to the South Carolina Department of Public Health (SCDPH). There has also been an outbreak in Florida, with 63 reported cases this year, according to the CDC.
Harris said in an interview after the meeting that it is not a matter of if, but when, measles comes to Alabama.
“There are already cases from that cluster that are in Charlotte, North Carolina, in East Tennessee. Georgia has had cases. Florida has a different cluster in the Fort Myers area,” Harris said. “We fully expect that we’re going to see it.”
According to the CDC, measles usually starts with a fever, cough, runny nose, and red eyes that leads to a rash. In serious cases, children can be hospitalized, develop pneumonia, swelling in the brain or die. According to the American Society of Microbiology, measles can also reset the immune system.
“I just want to remind you, measles is the most infectious disease,” Harris told committee members.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there were 2,280 confirmed cases of measles in the United States in 2025. Alabama reported one in north Alabama, contracted by an unvaccinated child who was traveling out of the country. The child later recovered and is not known to have infected other people. It was the first case of confirmed measles in the state since 2002.
About 1% of measles cases reported in the U.S. in 2025 were from international travelers, while the others were from states. Almost 90% of the cases were outbreak-related. In 2024, there were 285 cases of measles, according to the CDC.
The SCDPH says most of its cases are of unvaccinated children younger than 11. Harris said that the only way to protect children from measles is to get the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine. According to the CDC, 4% of the 2025 cases were fully vaccinated.
“Generally speaking, people in Alabama understand the importance of the measles vaccination. That’s not one of the controversial ones, or shouldn’t be,” Harris said.
Public health officials say about 95% of the population needs to be immunized against measles to achieve herd immunity. For the 2024-25 school year, the CDC estimates that 95.2% of Alabama kindergarten students were fully vaccinated against measles. However, November ADPH data showed that about 77% of children under 10 were up to date on the measles vaccine.
Dr. Adam Harrison, a member of the committee and Cullman-based physician, said most physicians have never seen a case of measles.
“We’re more than likely going to see this coming through urgent care or something. We preemptively tried to push out some education to physicians and practitioners that are going to see this,” he said during the meeting. “Most of us have not seen a case. Most of us have not depending, on your practice and your age and where you practice.”
That is the case for most of the physicians on the committee. However, Harris said that the state is prepared for when measles gets to Alabama.
Harris also said that the influenza season in Alabama is slowing down, but it is not done yet. As of Saturday, 8.89% of emergency department visits reported symptoms of a respiratory virus, a 17% increase over the week prior. About 8% of the visits resulted in a positive flu test, according to the department’s tracking website. That is a decrease from its height at the end of 2025 with 9.52% of visits resulting in a positive flu test.
Harris said there have been three pediatric flu-related deaths this season.
“We are seeing some influenza B, which is not unusual for that towards the end of the season to pop up a little bit after a lot of people have already had flu A,” Harris said.
