U.S. loses measles elimination status after 26 years, reports say
Nov 14, 2026
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The United States has lost the measles elimination status it held since 2000, a Pan American Health Organization commission found, The Wall Street Journal, Reuters and CNN reported Friday.
The commission met Nov. 10 to 13, and the CDC lists 5,182 confirmed U.S. cases this year as of Nov. 5. Separately, CMS told states they may hold off on denying or ending Medicaid coverage under the new work requirement until June 30, 2027, though the rules still start Jan. 1, and Houston Methodist's innovation chief said AI vendors must show staff reductions, not just time saved, before the system buys.
THE DETAILS
- FYIIncident Nov 13, 2026An independent commission that reports to the director of the Pan American Health Organization found that the United States no longer qualifies as having eliminated measles, CNN reported Friday, citing a source close to the process; The Wall Street Journal first reported the decision, and Reuters, citing The Wall Street Journal, said the organization revoked the status. The commission asks whether one strain has spread person to person for at least 12 months, and a confidential CDC report to the panel found 12 months of continuous transmission, a source told Reuters. The CDC's data page lists 5,182 confirmed cases in 2026 as of Nov. 5 in 47 jurisdictions, 96% of them outbreak-associated, and six confirmed deaths; state reports put this year's deaths at 10 or more, according to CNN. To regain the status, the country must end transmission and then go at least 12 months without an outbreak, Reuters reported. CDC Director Dr. Erica Schwartz told Reuters before the decision that losing the status would be "the same exact thing" for the agency's work with states to encourage immunization; Canada lost its status in 2025, the Pan American Health Organization said.
- WatchRegulation Nov 13, 2026
States that want the grace period from Jan. 1 are asked to notify CMS by Dec. 11, the agency's letter says.
States may suspend denials and disenrollments of Medicaid applicants and enrollees who do not show they meet the new work requirement through June 30, 2027, under a Nov. 13 letter from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. States must still put the requirement in place by Jan. 1, assess every application and renewal for compliance or exclusion during the grace period, and deny or end coverage for noncompliance once it ends, the letter says. The requirement applies to certain enrollees 19 to 64 and calls for 80 hours a month of work, community service, a work program or education, or a monthly income at a set threshold, CMS said. The grace period covers only the work requirement, not other eligibility rules such as income, and a state must request it in a mitigation plan that CMS approves. "States have made real progress," said Dan Brillman, director of the agency's Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services. Correction (Nov. 14): This item has been corrected. An earlier version said states that want the grace period from Jan. 1 must notify CMS by Dec. 11; the CMS letter says such states "are asked to notify CMS by December 11, 2026." - FYIWorkforce Nov 12, 2026Houston Methodist requires a 3-to-1 or 5-to-1 return on investment before it adopts a vendor's innovation and asks each vendor what reduction in full-time staff its technology has produced, Chief Innovation Officer Roberta Schwartz, PhD, told Becker's Hospital Review in an interview published Nov. 12. Vendors that promise time savings without reducing staff do not meet the bar, she said. Operating room scheduling, ambient scribing and autonomous coding each carry their own performance measures to keep their funding, according to Schwartz. "We aren't going to be able to pay for the innovations and keep all the people," she said. The eight-hospital system named no tool it had dropped or expanded.Source: Becker's Hospital Review
- FYIIncident Nov 13, 2026Synchron, whose first-generation brain-computer interface uses a catheter to place a stent near the motor cortex through the veins, has paused clinical trials of its second-generation wireless device, STAT reported Nov. 13. Company leaders said the pause is not safety related; WIRED reported that it followed performance issues and that the company is eliminating jobs in New York City, according to STAT. Synchron is working on a new device, STAT reported. Chief Executive Tom Oxley said on a conference panel the week before, "There are hundreds of components in our system, and it just takes a delayed one to slow down your submission to the FDA." The devices are meant to let people with paralysis, including from ALS, control digital devices.Source: STAT
- FYIEvidence Nov 12, 2026Personalized mobile health coaching from early pregnancy to 12 months postpartum did not change mean BMI at 12 months postpartum compared with usual maternity care in the Bump2Baby and Me randomized trial, conducted in Australia, Ireland, Spain and the U.K. and published Nov. 12 in The Lancet Digital Health. The trial enrolled 865 pregnant women at 12 to 24 weeks with a Monash gestational diabetes risk score of 3 or higher; mean BMI change was -0.04 kg/m2 with coaching and 0.04 kg/m2 with usual care. Serious adverse events occurred in 6% of the coaching group and 9% of controls, none judged related to the intervention. The authors said such programs might do better by targeting maternal outcomes beyond weight.Sources: The Lancet Digital Health, PubMed
- FYIEvidence Nov 13, 2026Among 741 andexanet-treated participants in the ANNEXA-I and ANNEXA-4 trials, 10.4% had at least one thrombotic event and 19.8% died, a pooled analysis published Nov. 13 in Stroke found; 80% had intracranial hemorrhage. Arterial events came a median of 3.5 days after randomization and venous thromboembolism a median of 14 days after. No baseline factor predicted all thrombotic events, but arterial events were associated with prior myocardial infarction (HR 2.64), eligibility for high-dose andexanet (HR 2.44), female sex and age, and arterial events were associated with death (HR 2.68). Starting anticoagulation after randomization was associated with fewer thrombotic events, the authors reported; several are AstraZeneca employees.
- FYIEvidence Nov 13, 2026Hypertension care led by community health workers who independently prescribed and titrated amlodipine and hydrochlorothiazide combination pills, guided by clinical decision support, was noninferior to nurse-led clinic care in rural Lesotho, a cluster-randomized trial in The Lancet Global Health reported Nov. 13. At 12 months, 78% of 386 intervention participants and 74% of 412 controls with previously controlled hypertension remained under 140/90 mm Hg (adjusted odds ratio 1.29, 95% CI 0.93 to 1.80), meeting the 10-point noninferiority margin. Serious adverse events, deaths and hospitalizations, were similar between groups. Participants averaged 64 years old, and 82% were women.Sources: The Lancet Global Health, PubMed
- FYIRegulation Nov 13, 2026The FDA on Nov. 13 approved obinutuzumab (Gazyva) to induce remission of proteinuria in adults with primary membranous nephropathy at risk of progression, the first drug approved for the disease. In the open-label phase 3 MAJESTY trial of 142 adults, complete remission at week 104, a urine protein-creatinine ratio of 0.3 g/g or less with stable eGFR, occurred in 36% on obinutuzumab and 6% on tacrolimus, the agency said. The label carries a boxed warning for hepatitis B reactivation and progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy; infusion-related reactions and upper respiratory infections were the most common side effects.Source: FDA