Wastewater in Coeur d’Alene tested positive for measles last week, but health officials have yet to confirm a case of the highly contagious virus in Idaho.
The positive test comes as thousands of Idaho students are poised to return to the classroom and vaccination rates are at a more than 10-year low in the state. Idaho has the lowest percentage of students vaccinated against measles nationwide, according to Centers for Disease Control data released last week.
Nationwide, there have been 1,333 confirmed cases of measles this year, and 92% of people who contracted the disease were not vaccinated or had an unknown vaccination status. The disease was officially eliminated from the United States in 2000, meaning the disease was not spreading within the country, according to the CDC.
It was eliminated due to high vaccination rates nationwide after the vaccine was licensed in 1963. When more than 95% of people in a community are vaccinated, most people are protected through herd immunity.
However, vaccination rates have been declining in recent years as outbreaks increase. Idaho has some of the lowest childhood vaccination rates in the country.
Idaho did not have any confirmed cases of measles as of Monday, AJ McWhorter, public information officer for the Idaho Department of Health confirmed in an email. No other wastewater testing of sewershed have come up positive for the disease.
The CDC began testing for measles in wastewater nationwide on July 28, due to the increase in outbreaks this year. The Coeur d’Alene wastewater site came up positive the next day, July 29. The finding was sent to health care providers Friday by the Idaho Health Alert Network, which encouraged providers to consider measles when diagnosing patients.
“The risk of widescale spread is low in most U.S. communities where population immunity is high; however, pockets of low MMR vaccination coverage leave some communities at higher risk for outbreaks,” the Health Alert Network message reads.
Since 2011, measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccination rates in Idaho among Kindergarteners have dropped.
Ahead of the 2011-12 school year, 89% of Kindergarteners had the MMR vaccinate compared to 78.5% ahead of the 2024-25 school year. The national MMR vaccination rate was 92.5% last year, a drop from the year before.
The COVID-19 pandemic appears to have initiated a drop in MMR vaccination rates in Idaho.
When the CDC released vaccination rates last week, the agency’s statement regarding the nationwide drop in childhood vaccines was more ambivalent than in the past, The Associated Press reported.
“The decision to vaccinate is a personal one. Parents should consult their health care providers on options for their families,” a statement obtained by the AP reads. “Vaccination remains the most effective way to protect children from serious diseases like measles and whooping cough, which can lead to hospitalization and long-term health complications.”
U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who President Donald Trump nominated and now oversees the CDC, has been a leading voice in the anti-vaccine movement for decades.
See the full CDC data on vaccination rates here.
