The United States may be days away from losing a public health badge it has carried since 2000. A panel of outside experts for the Pan American Health Organization is meeting behind closed doors in Washington through Friday to decide whether measles has been spreading inside the country without a break for at least a year.

If the answer is yes, the country would no longer be considered to have eliminated the disease. It would join Canada, which lost the same status last year, as the only nation in the Americas where the virus is again treated as homegrown.

The commission is reviewing reports from all 35 member countries. Mexico and Bolivia are also being watched closely because of long-running outbreaks of their own. The group will send its findings to the agency's director, Jarbas Barbosa, who makes the final call. A public announcement is expected early next week.

Numbers not seen in decades

The case count explains why so many doctors expect bad news. Federal health officials have confirmed 5,182 measles cases so far in 2026, more than double the 2,289 recorded in all of 2025 and far above the 285 counted in 2024. The virus has turned up in nearly every state.

Local health departments have tied eight deaths to this year's outbreaks while the federal tally stands at four. Since the start of 2025 the country has logged close to 7,500 cases and 11 deaths. An outbreak along the Arizona-Utah border that started in June 2025 is still active, which is the kind of unbroken chain the reviewers are looking for.

Almost all of the people who got sick were unvaccinated or had no known vaccine record. More than 40% of this year's patients were adults age 20 or older, many of whom likely missed their shots as children.

Fewer kids protected

Experts point to a steady slide in childhood immunizations. About 92.4% of kindergartners had the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine this year compared with 95.2% in 2020. Health officials say roughly 95% coverage is needed to keep measles from taking hold. Eighteen states now sit below 90%, with Idaho near 75%.

State averages also hide deeper gaps. In Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, one of the hardest-hit areas, 87.6% of kindergartners got the shot in the 2025-26 school year, down from 95.5% before the pandemic. Some school districts in other states report coverage closer to half.

What changes if the status is lost

Losing the label carries no penalty, but public health leaders call it a painful sign of how far protection has slipped. Many blame years of vaccine doubts that spread quickly online and they say Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made the problem worse. His department says vaccination rates were falling before he took office.

CDC Director Erica Schwartz said this week that the agency's playbook would stay the same either way. She said the response will keep stressing that the MMR shot remains the best defense against the virus. Noel Brewer, a University of North Carolina professor who leads an independent advisory panel on measles, briefed the reviewers on Tuesday and said the country has a serious measles problem no matter how the vote turns out.

Families who are unsure whether their children are protected can check with a doctor or local health department. Two doses of the vaccine are about 97% effective at preventing measles.