After the Texas Department of State Health Services announced a second measles death on Sunday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. flew to the outbreak’s epicenter in Gaines County and attended the child’s funeral.
“I came to Gaines County, Texas, today to comfort the Hildebrand family after the loss of their 8-year-old daughter Daisy,” Kennedy wrote on X. “My intention was to come down here quietly to console the families and to be with the community in their moment of grief.”
The 8-year-old girl died Thursday of “measles pulmonary failure,” the health department said in a statement. The first child died in February, the first measles death since 2015. RFK Jr. had previously appeared to downplay the severity of the outbreak, saying, “we have measles outbreaks every year.”
Neither the two children, nor a New Mexico man who tested positive for the viral, rash-inducing respiratory illness after his death in March, were vaccinated.
On Sunday RFK Jr. reportedly attended Daisy’s funeral, and posted several photos with the grieving families. He also posted on X that “the most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine” — echoing comments he made in early March in an opinion piece for Fox News.
RFK Jr. was seen outside the Mennonite church where the girl’s funeral services were held, but he skipped a news conference that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was holding nearby to address the outbreak. The CDC falls under HHS’s umbrella.
The outbreak started in January in Seminole, in west Texas, and has since spread to New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas and Mexico, with nearly 500 cases in Texas alone.
With News Wire Services
