Pennsylvania seeks CDC help on measles outbreak, demands recognition of deaths
WASHINGTON — The Pennsylvania health department said it was requesting emergency support from the U.S. CDC as it grapples with one of the country's largest and most deadly measles outbreaks, according to a document reviewed by Reuters on Thursday. The request comes on condition that the federal agency recognize four measles-associated deaths reported by the state, raising the stakes in a dispute with the Trump administration. The state's measles outbreak has become the focus of a standoff between U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Governor Josh Shapiro, a Democrat. Kennedy has cast doubt on whether deaths reported in U.S. measles outbreaks since he took office were due to the virus or another cause, and instructed the CDC not to include the Pennsylvania fatalities in a national tally. Disease experts say the move represented highly unusual interference by a health secretary in the determination by state health officials and could minimize the risks of measles in the eyes of the public. Kennedy has accused Shapiro of politicizing the outbreak in his state and of failing to
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