South Carolina has the largest measles outbreak in the nation, with 920 cases total from fall 2025 through Friday, Jan. 6, 2026. (iStock / Getty Images Plus)
COLUMBIA — More people are getting vaccinated for measles, even as the number of cases continues to increase, the state health department said Friday.
An outbreak centered in Spartanburg reached 920 cases Friday, the largest outbreak in the nation since measles started to spread widely last year.
One of the new cases was in Sumter County, the first reported outside the Upstate. Whether that case came directly from the outbreak or from elsewhere is unclear, state health officials said.
During January, more people got vaccinated against the virus than in any month since the outbreak started, according to the state health department.
Statewide, health professionals administered 16,800 shots of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine last month, a 72% increase over the year before. In Spartanburg County, the outbreak’s epicenter, the increase was even more significant, with 162% more vaccinations, according to the agency.
State epidemiologist Linda Bell said she hopes that shows people are taking the outbreak seriously.
“We are encouraged with the uptake in vaccinations this past month,” Bell told reporters.
Nearly 1,200 of those vaccines went to infants between the ages of six months and 11 months. That’s sooner than most children receive their first measles vaccine, which usually comes when they reach 1 year old. Moving up the schedule is recommended during an outbreak, since children are most susceptible to the disease, according to the health department.
Of the 920 cases, 243 were in children under the age of 5, according to agency data.
In an effort to quell the spread, one Democratic senator proposed requiring all students receive the measles vaccine before attending school, whether or not their parents signed a religious exemption form.
Sen. Margie Bright Matthews proposed a bill Thursday that would remove the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine from the immunizations a child can skip if they have a signed form claiming it goes against their religion. Every school-age child would have to get both doses of the vaccine between the ages of 1 and 5.
But her proposal is highly unlikely to get any traction in a state that banned public employers from mandating COVID vaccinations.
Last year, the Senate refused to confirm Gov. Henry McMaster’s nominee to lead the newly separate Department of Public Health due to accusations about his response to the pandemic that he called “outrageously false.” Dr. Edward Simmer, who senators approved nearly unanimously in February 2021 to lead the combined public health and environmental agency, remains in the role as an interim director.
The number of religious exemptions issued in the state increased significantly when students returned to school following the COVID-19 pandemic, going from less than 1% of all students during the 2014-2015 school year to more than 3.3% during the last school year.
Including medical exemptions, less than 90% of the state’s K-12 students submitted completed vaccination forms last year.
“This is serious, what we’re dealing with,” the Walterboro Democrat told senators Thursday. “If you really care about these children, let’s do something about it here.”
Matthews’ proposal received pushback from the state attorney general Friday, who said the bill went too far.
“The right to be free from compelled bodily intrusion is at the heart of the American experiment,” Attorney General Alan Wilson said in a statement. “Government should not substitute its judgment for parents, families, or individual conscience.”
Courtesy of South Carolina Daily Gazette
