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LINCOLN – A leading authority on infectious diseases says Nebraskans need to brace themselves for an increase in measles cases and possibly other maladies including polio, due to a state decrease in childhood vaccinations.
Among Nebraska seventh graders, vaccination rates for all four major vaccines fell, according to an annual report by the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services in December.
Rates for incoming kindergarten students in 2024-25 fell in three of five categories, with the percentage of students getting the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine falling just below the 95% mark deemed necessary to prevent a pandemic. (The rate for seventh graders was about 97%) Vaccination rates for hepatitis B and varicella (chickenpox) shots increased slightly in kids entering kindergarten, according to the survey, though the rates for polio and Dtap (diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis) decreased slightly to 96% and just above 95%, respectively.
Exact percentages used to create the graphic were not included in the Dec. 31 DHHS report, and when asked for them, the Examiner was told to file a public records request, a request DHHS later said would take until March to fulfill.
Measles, and vaccinations for the highly infectious disease, have made headlines recently after major outbreaks in South Carolina and west Texas.
Nebraska officials have fielded five reports of measles cases since late December, including the first case in 36 years in the state’s second-most populous county, Lancaster. The disease was detected in the wastewater of Lincoln twice last week.
This comes as Trump administration health officials, led by vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr., have reduced the number of recommended vaccines, and as the head of the nation’s vaccine advisory committee suggested that individual freedom was more important than protecting community health with vaccines.
Dr. Mark Rupp, interim chair of the Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, said the nation is witnessing the impact of decreased vaccination rates in the form of measles outbreaks.
“We should anticipate that such outbreaks will become more frequent and more widespread,” Rupp said. “Because measles is the most contagious childhood illness, he said “it will be the first to show up.”
But if vaccination trends continue to fall, Rupp predicted that outbreaks of polio, whooping cough and mumps will follow. They would be most likely to occur in “pockets” around the country and in Nebraska, he added.
A January report from Johns Hopkins University indicated that overall vaccination rates for measles, mumps and rubella for Nebraska’s kindergartners has been on a steady but slow decline in recent years, dropping from 96% over in 2020-21 to about 94% in the past two years.
A vaccination rate of 95% has been calculated as necessary to prevent the spread of measles in a community. That rate was also the target of the “Healthy People 2030” initiative, launched by the federal Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion” in 2020 to improve the nation’s health and well-being.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services blamed the decline in vaccinations on a loss of trust in public health officials. Between 2020 and 2024, that trust fell from 72% to 40%, according to HHS.
That is a much deeper decline that found in polling by the Kaiser Family Foundation, which found a drop of 65% to 61% in trust of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control over 18 months ending in June 2023. The trust level for local public health officials was 54%, down 10% over that period, according to KFF, which found a 30-percentage point difference between the trust level of those officials by Democrats and Republicans.
Rupp, meanwhile, cited the decrease in trust of science, medicine and authority, as well as a wellorganized, misinformation campaign by anti-vaccine groups. Rupp said directives from the federal government that undermine public health and vaccines have also contributed.
Alycia Davis, a spokeswoman for the Nebraska DHHS, said the agency is working with local health departments and providers to share best practices and educational materials that highlight “the importance of vaccines as the best protection against preventable diseases.”
DHHS, she said, also encourages doctors and other providers to have “proactive conversations” with patients about the importance of protecting their loved ones via vaccinations. Professional medical societies, Rupp said, are trying to combat disinformation about vaccines.
Nebraska’s DHHS has created an online database, the Nebraska State Immunization Information System or NESIIS, to help patients, parents and providers track someone’s individual vaccine status.
“Individual providers continue to support vaccination as the smartest way to prevent disease,” Dr. Rupp said.
