Just seven months into the year, confirmed measles cases in Maryland are already four times higher that they were for all of last year, but health officials say the situation could be much worse.
Almost all of the 12 cases recorded so far this year — up from three for all of 2025 — were “imported” into Maryland after out-of-state or international travel. But once here, the infections have not spread further, which experts say is a sign that the state’s relatively high vaccine coverage at 96% is protecting residents from the potentially fatal illness.
“This is higher than many previous years, but it doesn’t represent sustained transmission within Maryland,” said Dr. William Moss, director of the International Vaccine Access Center at Johns Hopkins University. “We have now had repeated importations into the state without sustained transmission.”
It’s a trend that he and public health officials hope to protect amid growing vaccine skepticism as new state data shows more parents opting their children out of required school vaccinations.
Approximately 96% of Marylanders have lifelong protection from measles due to being vaccinated, above the national average of 93%, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Other Marylanders who have already been sick with measles are also considered immune.
The recommend vaccination coverage rate to considered necessary to protect a community from measles is 96%, but as regions across the United States struggle with outbreaks, the dozen cases identified in Maryland reflect those challenges.
Of the 12 cases identified by the Maryland Department of Health this year, nine were detected after the resident returned from out-of-state travel, while two cases were detected after international travel. The most recent case, announced June 23 by the health department, did not indicate where the individual may have picked up measles.
But Moss says that the lack of sustained community transmission is “a signal of the strength of our immunization program and our really good measles vaccine coverage.”
That coverage may be slipping, as more Maryland families cite religious reasons to opt their kids out of vaccinations that are otherwise required to enter kindergarten through religious exemptions. The Maryland Department of Health reports that during the 2025-2026 school year, 2.1% of kindergartners had religious exemptions from the vaccinations, up from 1.7% the year before.
That’s more than 1,300 of the 65,500 kindergartners enrolled in the 2025-2026 school year. It’s the highest percentage since 2019-2020, when the religious exemption rate was 2.7% amid disruptions in the school year due to COVID-19.
That said, overall vaccine coverage among kindergarteners was still at least 95% in every Maryland county, even in counties where religious exemptions were higher like Allegany and Worcester, according to the health department’s most recent data.
“High vaccination rates in schools are crucial for preventing outbreaks and maintaining community immunity,” the Maryland Department of Health said in a written statement Monday. “Maryland maintains a strong safety net with 96.7% of kindergarteners reported as vaccinated in the 2025-2026 school year.”
Dr. Andrea Berry is an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and a pediatric infectious disease specialist at University of Maryland Golisano Children’s Hospital. She says that over the last few years, there’s been growing confusion and vaccine skepticism among parents, which leads them to opt their kids out of vaccines, including the measles vaccine.
“There is a very close relationship between vaccination rates and the likelihood of an outbreak,” she said. “Overall, Maryland does a really great job getting children vaccinated, but the increase in these exemptions stems from vaccine hesitancy.”
Meanwhile, the number of measles cases climbs across the United States with 2,318 cases confirmed as of July 23 this year. Those cases have reached 44 states and Washington, D.C., with Maryland’s neighbors among the states with the largest measles outbreaks currently, with Virginia facing 176 measles cases and Pennsylvania facing 134 cases.
Despite Virginia’s high vaccination rate at 96%, the measles outbreak it’s facing occurred in two rural counties where vaccination rates are less than 75%. Meanwhile, Pennsylvania’s statewide vaccination rate is 92%.
Moss warns that the growing measles cases in neighboring states create a greater chance of exposure when Marylanders are visiting those regions, especially in communities with lower vaccination coverage. He says Maryland is “not immune to having local transmission.”
“I suspect that we have communities here in Maryland that have lower vaccine coverage … but fortunately, these imported cases have not made it into those communities yet,” he said. “Traveling to a place where there’s ongoing measles virus transmission … the most important thing is to make sure you’re protected against measles.”
Berry noted that anyone past the age of 6 months can get a measles vaccination. She urges Marylanders to get vaccinated if they are not already protected through prior illness from measles, especially as cases rise in neighboring states.
“Now that there are so many outbreaks all throughout the United States, it’s more likely that somebody is going to travel to those places or speak to somebody who did travel those places,” she said. “With the vaccine, you’re much less likely to get measles, and when people do get measles, it is not as severe.”
