The Measles Outbreak In South Carolina Is Spiraling Out Of Control

America is broken and it seems like nobody is bothering to try to repair it. That’s a general statement, to be sure, so if you need some marking point to serve as a specific example of our national malfunction, the return of measles to our country can fit the bill. It’s not quite as flashy as the secret police shooting citizens, of course. But I think that there is something about children with angry rashes across their necks sitting in hospital beds, or in body bags, that will have a way of clarifying the mind.

With a grifter like RFK Jr. at the helm of American health, having built a career based on anti-vaxxer conspiracy theories and health misinformation, our country became a fertile host once more to this horrific disease. Kennedy’s inability to properly communicate to the nation what needs to happen, which is another concentrated MMR vaccination effort, combined with his eugenics-lite belief system on matters of health, has all led to this. 2025 saw the highest number of Americans infected by measles in decades, 3 people died, we’re about to lose our elimination status for the disease, and an outbreak in South Carolina has us off to a rip roaring start to 2026.

While this is largely due to the unvaccinated population among us, allowing the disease to spread where it otherwise would not, we’ve seen enough breakthrough infections that even being one of the “responsible ones” won’t necessarily keep you safe any longer. And the South Carolina outbreak of measles is officially off the rails.

A week ago, ArsTechnica had an alarming post about how South Carolina saw well over a hundred new cases of measles and over 400 people quarantined in a handful of days.

Amid the outbreak, South Carolina health officials have been providing updates on cases every Tuesday and Friday. On Tuesday, state health officials reported 124 more cases since last Friday, which had 99 new cases since the previous Tuesday. On that day, January 6, officials noted a more modest increase of 26 cases, bringing the outbreak total at that point to 211 cases.

With the 3-month-old outbreak now doubled in just a week, health officials are renewing calls for people to get vaccinated against the highly infectious virus—an effort that has met with little success since October. Still, the health department is activating its mobile health unit to offer free measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccinations, as well as flu vaccinations at two locations today and Thursday in the Spartanburg area, the epicenter of the outbreak.

Those same officials had another dire warning: the outbreak had grown so big that they no longer had the ability to perform contact tracing. Where the disease would go next was anyone’s guess.

The outbreak is still growing to date. At least 88 more cases of measles were recorded in South Carolina in less than a week since the Ars post. Schools remain the most problematic vector, but it’s no longer just elementary and secondary schools that are in trouble. Colleges are now part of the party.

There are at least 15 schools — including elementary, middle and high schools — which currently have students in quarantine.

Health officials also warned of exposures at Clemson University and Anderson University, both located in northwestern South Carolina, which have a combined 88 students in quarantine.

While these numbers from South Carolina are publicly stated, the CDC site tallying measles infections apparently can’t keep up. The last time the numbers were updated there was January 14th, but even those numbers appear to be incorrectly low. The site also announces that it is moving its reporting schedule from every Wednesday to Fridays, which is your classic “bad news dumping ground” day.

But that change won’t keep the news of how the South Carolina outbreak has gone national from being reported.

Measles continue to spread in the Upstate but now, health leaders in Washington state say the outbreak here in South Carolina is connected to cases on the west coast. The Snohomish County Health Department confirmed three cases in children who were exposed to a contagious family visiting from South Carolina.

Previously, the Snohomish County Health Department and Public Health – Seattle & King County were notified that three members of a South Carolina family, one adult and two children, were infectious while visiting King and Snohomish counties from Dec. 27, 2025 through Jan. 1, 2026. The family visited multiple locations in Everett, Marysville and Mukilteo while contagious before being diagnosed. They also traveled through Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and visited a car rental facility near the airport.

In any sane administration, a measles task force would be mobilized to build out a strategy to contain these outbreaks, to communicate actions plans to the public, and to execute on actions designed to keep the public healthy. Trump, RFK Jr., and the health agencies they’re in charge of are barely talking about this. They are ignoring the problem and that will ensure that it becomes much, much worse.

Impeachments are what’s necessary here, starting with Kennedy, who is clearly asleep at the wheel. A feckless Congress unwilling to do its job should have members tossed out on their ass. Staff at HHS and its child agencies should be in full revolt, sounding the alarm.

Measles is no fucking joke, folks. But our government currently is.