New York City declared a health emergency Tuesday after a measles outbreak was reported in an orthodox-Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn.
“Today, I am declaring a public health emergency due to the measles outbreak,” said Oxiris Barbot, the city’s health commissioner. “ [The department] is ordering all people in Williamsburg to get vaccinated against measles.”
Today, I am declaring a public health emergency due to the measles outbreak. @nycHealthy is ordering all people in Williamsburg to get vaccinated against measles. https://t.co/1u29736yTy
— Commissioner Oxiris Barbot (@NYCHealthCommr) April 9, 2019
Mayor Bill de Blasio, who is eyeing a 2020 run for president, called the recent measles outbreak “very troubling” during a news conference Tuesday.
The city has seen 285 confirmed cases since the outbreak began in the fall, according to the New York Times. A total of 21 of those cases led to hospitalizations, including five admissions to the intensive care unit.
Days earlier in nearby Rockland County, a northern suburb of the city, public health officials banned unvaccinated children from public spaces, a measure that was later struck down by a judge.
The city said Tuesday it would fine or possibly shut down Jewish schools in the Brooklyn neighborhood that do not mandate people receive the measles vaccination.
[Read more: CDC confirms 314 cases of measles so far in 2019]
