Hotez measles prediction: 'Something awful is happening in Texas'

The Dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Dr Peter Hotez is concerned about measles in his state of Texas, so much that he is raising the alarm by predicting a measles outbreak could happen as early as the winter or spring of 2018. In an article published in PLoS Medicine last fall, Hotez writes: Measles vaccination coverage in certain Texas counties is dangerously close to dropping below the 95% coverage rate necessary to ensure herd immunity and prevent measles outbreaks. He tells me during the interview, "Something awful is happening in Texas," Dr Hotez said. "Texas is becoming the epicenter of what looks like, some neo-antivaxxer movement". There have been some 50,000 nonmedical or "reasons of conscience" exemptions to school immunization laws, almost double the number of exemptions in 2010.