UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh is facing its largest measles exposure to date after two infected visitors entered multiple public areas of the facility.
The exposure occurred on August 27 during a scheduled appointment involving a child and two parents who subsequently tested positive for the virus.
Health officials confirmed that the infected individuals are not residents of Allegheny County and left the area after their visit. The potential exposure affected the hospital main lobby, third-floor waiting and clinic areas, cafeteria, and elevators, putting hundreds of people at risk.
Dr Donald Yealy, the chief medical officer and chair of emergency medicine at UPMC, told TribLive on Tuesday that the exposure involved an unusually large group of people.
"It is a large number of people, bigger than what we've seen before," Yealy said. He declined to state whether the hospital visit was directly related to measles.
This event marks the third confirmed measles case at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh this year. The first involved a resident of Jefferson County who tested positive on August 20 after visiting the medical center on August 12 and August 18. That incident was the first confirmed measles case in Allegheny County since 2019.
UPMC is currently contacting exposed staff and patients. At the same time, the Allegheny County Health Department is urging anyone who spent time in the affected areas to check their vaccination records and seek guidance from a doctor.
Measles is considered the most infectious disease known to medicine. The virus can remain suspended in the air for up to two hours after a sick individual passes through, and it is capable of infecting nine out of every ten unvaccinated people who are exposed.
Restrictions at Geisinger Medical Center
The exposure in Pittsburgh follows a separate incident at Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, Pennsylvania, which locked down its neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) after a visitor tested positive for measles.
Danville is located about a two-and-a-half-hour drive outside Philadelphia. Hospital officials said the infected visitor spent four days inside the unit from August 14 to August 17 before receiving a measles diagnosis.
The visitor is no longer inside the unit. Hospital leaders have not specified how long the access restrictions will remain in place or whether the visitor passed measles to anyone else.
Neonatal intensive care units care for premature babies and sick infants who require round-the-clock treatment. Considered the most vulnerable patients in a hospital, these newborns are too young to be vaccinated against measles or virtually any other disease.
Under new rules at Geisinger Medical Center, only parents or legal guardians are now permitted to visit the unit. All permitted visitors must show no signs or symptoms of measles, undergo screening upon arrival, and are "highly encouraged" to wear a surgical mask.
The hospital has halted all visiting privileges for extended family members. At present, there is no exemption for vaccinated immediate family, such as grandparents, to visit the unit.
Pennsylvania Deaths and National Outbreak
The hospital exposures come as Pennsylvania reports two deaths linked to measles, marking the first fatalities from the disease in the nation this year and the first in the state in 35 years.
Both deaths occurred in Lancaster County, which health officials identified as the epicenter of the state outbreak.
State data updated on September 2 shows that 540 people in Pennsylvania have contracted measles during the current outbreak. None of those infected were fully vaccinated, and 91 patients required hospitalization.
Nationwide, the United States is currently battling a major measles outbreak. Figures updated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on August 27 record 2,903 infections so far this year, representing the highest annual total since 1991.
The vast majority of cases in both 2025 and 2026 occurred in individuals who had not received both doses of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine.
The MMR shot is typically administered once between 12 and 15 months of age and again between ages four and six. Two doses slash the risk of measles infection by 97 percent, according to the CDC.
Symptoms and Health Risks of Measles
Measles is a highly infectious viral illness characterized by a cough, fever, a distinctive blotchy rash that starts on the face before spreading down the body, and tiny white spots inside the mouth called Koplik spots.
The virus spreads through direct contact with infectious droplets or through the air. Patients with a measles infection are contagious from four days before the rash appears through four days after it emerges. Enclosed areas like airports and airplanes are extremely risky locations for disease transmission.
The virus first invades the respiratory system, then spreads to the lymph nodes and throughout the body. As a result, it can affect the lungs, brain, and central nervous system.
While measles sometimes causes milder symptoms, including diarrhea, sore throat, and achiness, it leads to pneumonia in roughly six percent of otherwise healthy children, and more often in malnourished children.
Brain swelling, or encephalitis, is rare, occurring in about one in 1,000 cases. However, it is deadly in roughly 15 to 20 percent of those who develop it, while about 20 percent of survivors are left with permanent neurological damage, such as brain damage, deafness, or intellectual disability.
Measles also severely damages a child's immune system, making them susceptible to other potentially devastating bacterial and viral infections they were previously protected against.
Vaccination Coverage and Global Trends
Before measles vaccines first emerged in the 1960s, the virus caused epidemics with up to 2.6 million global deaths every year. By 2023, that number had fallen to roughly 107,000 deaths worldwide.
Nationwide in the United States, 92.4 percent of kindergarteners are fully vaccinated against measles, which falls below the CDC threshold of 95 percent required for herd immunity.
In Pennsylvania, the MMR vaccination rate among kindergarteners is 94.6 percent, while rates in Maryland and Iowa stand at 96 percent and 90 percent, respectively.
Exemptions are also on the rise nationally at 4.2 percent, representing a 17 percent increase from 1.6 percent just over a decade ago.
