In what may have been an ill-advised attempt to raise his national profile ahead of the 2028 presidential primary season, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) tried this week to start a war with the Trump administration over vaccines, and the story he was trying to sell has started to crumble under scrutiny.  

Facts are stubborn things and the truth, as delivered by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has smacked Shapiro right in the face. No, wrote Kennedy in a post on X, two unvaccinated people did not die from measles, but, yes, Shapiro got the headlines he was looking for.

Let's back up a bit.

On Tuesday, Shapiro's Dept. of Health put out a press release claiming there had been "two measles-associated deaths" of unvaccinated persons in Lancaster County.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) today confirmed two measles-associated deaths in Pennsylvania. Both individuals were unvaccinated. These mark the first deaths related to measles within the Commonwealth in 35 years.   

Gov. Shapiro immediately called a press conference at Lancaster General Health’s Women and Babies Hospital – which Kennedy described as an "unseemly rush to Lancaster County to convene a national press conference and his giddy delight in announcing two measles deaths" – in which he claimed the deaths were due to “the consequences of a lack of immunization.” 

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Shapiro laid it on thick, saying, “We hope, and we pray, that those deaths will be the last,” and calling illness and death from measles “completely preventable.” He revealed that Kennedy had actually called him offering the help of the federal government, but “I made very clear that his actions and the rhetoric that’s coming from this administration are having a negative impact on communities across America, particularly right here in Pennsylvania.”

The media, of course, ran with the narrative that the Trump administration, which recently offered guidance to parents about adjusting the childhood immunization schedule to better fit their family's needs, had basically killed the two people in Lancaster County.

Then, the truth emerged. 

One of the deaths, it turned out, was sadly that of a newborn baby; the Lancaster County coroner confirmed that the infant did not die from measles. The other death is still being investigated, but Kennedy pointed out something very important: no measles deaths have been reported to the coroner's office, as is required by law.

"The announcement appears to have been premature, and the deaths may even have been altogether fabricated by one of the Governor's hopeful staffers," he wrote. "The Lancaster County Coroner says that it has no record of any measles deaths. State law requires that all measles deaths be reported to the coroner."

Oh.

(Here's Kennedy's post in its entirety.)

Governor Shapiro's unseemly rush to Lancaster County to convene a national press conference and his giddy delight in announcing two measles deaths was a morose commentary on the contemporary political dialogue. The performance was a replay of the Democrats' COVID playbook: fearmongering, misinformation, finger-pointing, and the weaponization of infectious disease fears for political gain.

The announcement appears to have been premature, and the deaths may even have been altogether fabricated by one of the Governor's hopeful staffers. The Lancaster County Coroner says that it has no record of any measles deaths. State law requires that all measles deaths be reported to the coroner.

Governor Shapiro shattered tradition and violated standard public health policy by refusing to share information with the County Health Department or CDC. 

Since I have been in office, CDC has had a superb record of cooperation, information sharing, and professionalism with blue- and red-state governors and health officials. Those collaborations have resulted in effective control of the global measles outbreak in this country.

Governor Shapiro got his headlines. He correctly gambled that the slavish mainstream media would dutifully amplify his scolding without any effort to check his facts.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) announced on Thursday that it, too, will investigate the deaths.

Meanwhile, Shapiro is probably looking for his next tragedy to exploit in order to get the national spotlight to shine on him. If this was supposed to be his audition for the 2028 national stage, it certainly was a memorable one – for all the wrong reasons.