Canada loses its measles elimination status. Will the U.S. be next?

Canada has lost its measles elimination status, the country’s Public Health Agency announced Monday.

Canada has lost its measles elimination status, the country’s Public Health Agency announced Monday. It’s the first country in the Americas to do so since the pandemic, and it could serve as a warning sign for others.

There are multiple criteria for losing an official measles elimination status, including declines in vaccination rates. The most significant factor is the ongoing spread of the same strain of the virus for a full year.

Canada’s outbreak started in October 2024 in New Brunswick, a province on the country’s eastern seaboard. As of Monday, Canada’s health officials had tallied 5,138 measles cases since the outbreak began. Two babies, infected in utero, were born pre-term and died.

Despite “great efforts” made by Canadian health officials, “the country has lost its measles elimination status and is now considered endemic for the disease,” Jarbas Barbosa, the head of the Pan American Health Organization, said during a media briefing Monday.

“This loss represents a setback, of course, but it is also reversible,” Barbosa said.