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---
title: Measles Outbreak in Minnesota Linked to Anti-Vaccine Groups
description: Minnesota is experiencing the largest outbreak of measles in nearly 30 years, specifically within a community of Somali immigrants
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author: Aric Jenkins
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article:published_time: 2017-05-05T21:10:28.000Z
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og:title: Minnesota Is Experiencing Its Largest Outbreak of Measles in Nearly 30 Years
og:description: It appears to be linked to the anti-vaccine movement
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twitter:title: Minnesota Is Experiencing Its Largest Outbreak of Measles in Nearly 30 Years
twitter:description: It appears to be linked to the anti-vaccine movement
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# Minnesota Is Experiencing Its Largest Outbreak of Measles in Nearly 30 Years

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by 

[Aric Jenkins](https://time.com/author/aric-jenkins/)


## Aric Jenkins


May 5, 2017 9:10 PM UTC

by 

[Aric Jenkins](https://time.com/author/aric-jenkins/)


## Aric Jenkins


May 5, 2017 9:10 PM UTC

[Minnesota](http://time.com/4694921/tim-kaine-son-arrested-donald-trump/) is having its largest outbreak of [measles](http://time.com/3752436/ebola-measles-vaccination/) in nearly 30 years after a number of [Somalian](http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/8851/america-is-expanding-its-secretive-war-in-somalia) immigrants apparently bought into the rhetoric of [anti-vaccination](http://time.com/4736871/vaccine-skeptics-parents-information/) campaigners and did not vaccinate their children.

The state has confirmed 41 cases of the disease since April 11, according to a [press release from the Minnesota Department of Health](http://www.health.state.mn.us/news/pressrel/2017/measles050417.html), resulting in the largest outbreak this year in the U.S. despite measles being eradicated in the country the early 2000s.

Eleven patients had been hospitalized as of Friday, Doug Schultz, a spokesman for the Minnesota Department of Health, [told the New York _Times_.](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/05/us/measles-minnesota-vaccines.html?smid=tw-share) All of the patients except one adult health care worker were children younger than 10, Schultz said.

Schultz said that anti-vaccine activists had “targeted” members of the Somali community in Minnesota.

Measles is highly contagious and cause severe illness and death. Andrew Wakefield, founder of the modern anti-vaccine movement, [told the Washington _Post_](https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/anti-vaccine-activists-spark-a-states-worst-measles-outbreak-in-decades/2017/05/04/a1fac952-2f39-11e7-9dec-764dc781686f%5Fstory.html?hpid=hp%5Fhp-top-table-main%5Fmeasles-910a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm%5Fterm=.1a2d1c255a78) Friday that he doesn’t “feel responsible at all.”

“The Somalis had decided themselves that they were particularly concerned,” Wakefield said. “I was responding to that.”

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