A fifth person has died in Pennsylvania's measles outbreak.
The state's health department said Wednesday that the victim was an unvaccinated resident of Lancaster County, the outbreak's epicenter since it began in late April. Statewide, the case count has climbed to 943 across 39 counties, with 119 new infections reported in the past week alone. At least 176 people have been hospitalized. Lancaster County accounts for 381 of those cases and three of the outbreak's five deaths; officials have not released further details about the person who died this week.
Two of the outbreak's other deaths were infants too young to be vaccinated (a newborn boy and a 6-week-old girl), collateral damage of other people's choices. This latest death was not: the victim could have gotten the shot and didn't. Seven months in, with case counts still rising by more than 100 a week, the outbreak keeps growing for a reason that has nothing to do with the virus's biology.
Measles is about as preventable as infectious disease gets, which makes an outbreak this size, this far in, a story about vaccination rates, not bad luck.