PolitiFact Rates Kennedy's Claim About Measles Benefits False as Texas Outbreak Grows

As measles cases continue to spread across the United States, a claim by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. that catching the virus might carry health benefits has drawn a "False" ruling from PolitiFact.

Kennedy made the remarks during the March 4 episode of a Fox Nation program. Dr. Marc Siegel, Fox's chief medical analyst, asked him about people who attend measles parties to get infected on purpose. Kennedy said he advises against such gatherings but added that "wild infection" could offer protection later in life. He said he had attended measles and chicken pox parties as a child and developed natural immunity. Studies, he said, suggest infection boosts the immune system against cancers, atopic diseases and cardiac disease. "It's not well-studied," he said, adding that he would never advise anyone to get sick.

PolitiFact found that research on the question is not conclusive. Some studies have linked measles infection to better outcomes against certain diseases later on, but they had limitations and none showed that measles caused those results. The Health and Human Services Department did not respond to PolitiFact's request to identify the studies Kennedy had in mind.

Science Feedback, which fact-checks scientific claims, examined similar social media posts. One cited a 1998 study, published in what was then a non-peer-reviewed outlet, on lower adult cancer risk among people who had measles. Another cited a 2015 study of measles and reduced cardiac mortality among Japanese adults. Both relied on self-reported surveys and neither established causation. A 2000 UK study tied childhood infections, including measles, to a lower risk of Hodgkin's disease, again without proving causation.

A 2013 study of 1,142 people born in 1947 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, associated childhood measles and influenza with a lower risk of cancer death in adulthood. Lead author Peter Tennant of the University of Leeds called it "hypothesis generating" and said he was unaware of similar follow-up work. The study also linked whooping cough to a markedly higher cancer risk, so it "cannot be said to support Robert Kennedy's assertion," he said. On atopic diseases, Johns Hopkins scholar Amesh Adalja said Kennedy likely meant a 1996 West Africa study that has not been replicated, while other research reached the opposite conclusion.

Experts agreed that recovering from measles gives lasting protection against the disease itself. But research also shows the virus can cause "immune amnesia," erasing immune memory of earlier infections. Dr. David Wohl of the University of North Carolina said infection "resets our immune system and depletes cells that recognize and respond to other pathogens." Dr. David Gorski, a Michigan cancer surgeon, cited three studies showing the effect can last up to three years. A 2019 study of 77 unvaccinated Dutch children found measles wiped out 11% to 73% of their antibodies, an effect not seen in vaccinated children.

The World Health Organization's Dr. Margaret Harris said children with measles have a 1 in 5 chance of hospitalization, about 1 in 20 infected people develop pneumonia, and 1 in 1,000 develop encephalitis. Measles killed about 107,500 people worldwide in 2023. Two doses of the vaccine are 97% effective at preventing infection.

Texas had reported 279 cases as of March 18, with 36 hospitalizations and the death of a child. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention counted 301 confirmed cases in 14 states, including Texas, as of March 13. Authorities were also investigating the death of a New Mexico adult who tested positive for measles.

Patricia Stinchfield, immediate past president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, compared choosing natural infection over vaccination to "playing infectious disease roulette." She noted that vaccination eliminated measles in the U.S. in 2000 and said people should not be encouraged to choose disease over immunization.