The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Monday that 4.2 percent of U.S. kindergartners, about 155,000 children, held at least one vaccine exemption during the 2025-26 school year, a record high that pushed measles-vaccine coverage in the incoming class below the level public-health officials say is needed to prevent outbreaks.
The rise, from 3.6 percent a year earlier, dropped routine coverage of the measles, mumps and rubella shot among kindergartners to 92.4 percent, short of the 95 percent threshold medical experts consider necessary to block measles transmission. The United States has already logged 2,566 measles cases in 2026, according to the CDC, the highest annual count since 1991.
What the data show
Forty-one states and Washington, D.C., reported higher exemption rates, the CDC said. Nearly the entire increase came from non-medical exemptions filed for personal or religious reasons; medical exemptions held steady at 0.2 percent. Ohio's rate rose to 5.7 percent from 4.7 percent, one of the sharpest jumps in the country. Coverage for the DTaP shot, which guards against diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough, also fell, to 92 percent.
About 280,000 kindergartners started school last year without a record of the two MMR doses that health officials say confer 97 percent lifetime protection against measles. The CDC said 93 percent of Americans diagnosed with measles this year were unvaccinated.
Policy in flux
The release lands a week after President Trump signed an executive order recommending fewer routine childhood shots and splitting the combined MMR vaccine into three separate doses. States, not Washington, set school-entry requirements, but federal guidance shapes pediatric practice and insurance coverage.
Dr. David Margolius, director of the Cleveland Department of Public Health, called the exemption rise "disappointing, but not surprising." He added: "It's indicative of the lack of clear messaging at the national level about vaccines."
Active measles outbreaks are underway in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Utah. The Pan American Health Organization is expected to decide in November whether the United States still qualifies as having eliminated measles from circulation, a status Washington has held since 2000. Since the start of 2025, more than 4,850 people in the U.S. have been infected and three have died, ProPublica reported, including two unvaccinated girls in West Texas.
Both outlets reporting Monday's CDC data lean left, and public-health critics of school vaccine mandates did not publicly respond to the release by press time. The CDC, in a statement, said it "continues to encourage parents to discuss vaccination options with their doctors."
PAHO's November review will determine whether the elimination status the country has held for a quarter century survives the outbreak year.