A single US measles outbreak can cost millions of dollars, study estimates

The overall cost of containing a 2025 measles outbreak in ​New Mexico was nearly $5.4 million, a new study estimates.

The figure includes ⁠expenses for medical care, public health services and lost productivity, not just for the 57 adult patients and for caregivers of the 43 infected children but also for 205 exposed ‌and quarantined contacts and 133 public health responders.

The total breaks down to an average of more than $53,000 for each of the 100 ‌confirmed cases in the outbreak, according to researchers from the New Mexico ‌Department ⁠of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The outbreak ⁠began in an undervaccinated community in Texas in January 2025 and spread across the state line into New Mexico in February, first appearing in border areas. The CDC declared the outbreak over ​in September 2025.

So far in ‌2026, the United States has confirmed more than 2,300 measles infections, surpassing the 2025 tally to reach the highest annual total in 35 years amid declining vaccination rates.

In the 2025 New Mexico outbreak, public health response efforts accounted ‌for roughly $3.2 million, with vaccination-related activities accounting for about $2.1 million of the total, ​the researchers reported on Monday in Annals of Internal Medicine.

Direct medical costs totaled $290,000, including $238,000 for seven hospitalisations, $32,000 for 79 outpatient visits ⁠and $20,000 for 1,286 commercial laboratory tests, they calculated.

Productivity loss estimates from missed work for adult patients, adult caregivers of patients under age 15, adult contacts of infected ‌individuals and one patient who died totaled nearly $1.6 million.

The researchers said that costs might not have been accurately estimated, and some expenses were unavailable, such as over-the-counter medications and travel expenses for care.

The CDC declined to comment and the New Mexico Department of Health did not immediately respond.

Katherine Wells of Lubbock Public Health, who had no role in the New Mexico study, wrote separately on ‌July 9 in the American Journal of Public Health about the west Texas outbreak that spread ​to New Mexico. “When people hear that Lubbock had 50 measles cases in 2025, they often picture something manageable… That is not what ⁠50 measles cases look like,” she wrote.

Each case is the start of a cascade ⁠of exposures, responses, and system disruptions, she said.

Across the United States, vaccination coverage is declining and conditions that prevent the spread of measles ‌are weakening, Wells wrote.

“Until we account for the full cost of outbreaks, not just the cases but the consequences, we will continue to underestimate their ​impact and undervalue the systems required to prevent them,” she concluded.