City and Army health officials on Tuesday confirmed the first two cases of measles in the El Paso region amid the ongoing West Texas and Panhandle outbreak.
Both infections involved children who weren't vaccinated against measles, city health officials said in a news release Tuesday night.
"We cannot stress enough the importance of measles vaccination," Vinny Taneja, director of the city's Department of Public Health, said in a statement Tuesday night. "Measles is a highly contagious respiratory illness that can lead to severe complications, especially for those who are unvaccinated. We strongly urge parents to ensure their children are protected."
A patient with measles symptoms was checked in Friday at the Mendoza Soldier Family Care Center on Fort Bliss, according to a Tuesday news release from William Beaumont Army Medical Center.
Amabilia G. Payen, a spokesperson for William Beaumont Army Medical Center, did not provide further details about the patient, including vaccination history. She initially said the Beaumont case was connected to the outbreak in West Texas and the Panhandle, but said later that Army health officials are performing contact tracing to see if the case is connected to the outbreak.
City health officials said a 3-year-old boy who lives in the city of El Paso had also been confirmed to have measles. The officials said the child was not vaccinated against measles, but didn't provide other information, including when he became ill.
Army health officials began contact tracing efforts to mitigate the spread of the disease, and also notified local and state health officials. The El Paso Department of Public Health has not responded to questions from El Paso Matters.
In addition to El Paso's measles cases, Mexican health authorities confirmed four cases of measles, or sarampión, in neighboring Ciudad Juárez as of Monday.
Three unvaccinated people, including two school-aged children with no underlying health conditions, have died from measles this year in Texas and New Mexico. Since late January, the Texas Department of State Health Services has reported more than 500 measles cases including 57 hospitalizations. The outbreak spread from Gaines County, near Lubbock, which is home to a close-knit and under-vaccinated Mennonite community.
The Chihuahua health department has also confirmed nearly 200 cases since March with more than half of those cases concentrated in the city of Cuauhtémoc, where a large Mennonite community resides nearby. The first patient in Chihuahua was a Mennonite youth from Texas visiting Mexico with their family, Norte Digital reported.
Authorities from the Secretaría de Salud Chihuahua give an update on the growing measles outbreak in Chihuahua, Mexico and urge parents to get the MMR vaccine for their children at a press conference March 28, 2025. (Secretaria de Salud Chihuahua Facebook) The vast majority of measles cases in Texas, New Mexico and Chihuahua are patients who are unvaccinated or who have no known history of vaccination, according to data from their respective health departments.
Measles is highly contagious and spreads from breathing in infectious, respiratory droplets. One infected person can infect up to nine out of 10 unprotected people nearby, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. People who are vaccinated can still contract measles, but the illness is more likely to be mild and the person is less likely to infect others.
The state of Colorado reported Monday its first measles case, an unvaccinated infant, after the baby traveled with family to the outbreak area in Chihuahua. The baby was under a year old – younger than the recommended age for vaccination.
El Paso's last measles outbreak tallied six cases in 2019, all reported on Fort Bliss. William Beaumont Army Medical Center first notified the public about the latest exposure Friday on social media.
Texas requires two MMR vaccine doses for all children entering kindergarten in public and private schools.
El Paso health authority Dr. Hector Ocaranza said in an email to El Paso Matters that the community should not expect measles to spread in El Paso similar to in Gaines County because of the local vaccination rate.
About 96% of El Paso County kindergarteners last school year received the measles-mumps-rubella, or MMR, vaccine – higher than the 95% vaccination rate the CDC set as the threshold for herd immunity. By comparison, only 82% of kindergarteners in the outbreak epicenter of Gaines County received the MMR vaccine.
"What we are expecting is to have small pockets of unvaccinated people infected primarily in daycares or schools," Ocaranza said. "People should be concerned if they are unvaccinated and also have contact with people considered to be high-risk for complications."
Chihuahua and Juárez health departments launched an immunization campaign in Juárez the last week of March, setting up pop-up vaccination clinics in various commercial and public places throughout the city, as well as schools and government buildings. Chihuahua health authorities did not respond to El Paso Matters' questions about vaccination rates or future immunization campaigns.
"Diseases do not recognize borders," Ocaranza said. "Given our region's close cross-border ties, we fully expected to see cases and have been preparing accordingly. Our focus is on responding quickly and effectively to protect the health of our entire binational community."
This article first appeared on El Paso Matters and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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