As the number of measles cases continues to climb, the good news is there are no known measles cases in the Houston area, according to the city's health department, which suspected two cases on Friday but the tests both came up negative.
Almost all the recent measles cases in Texas are confined to West Texas, and the head of the US Department of Health and Human Services said on Saturday that he's making the outbreak his top priority.
The measles cases have grown to 146 across nine counties, with 20 hospitalizations and one child death; and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said his office sending 2,000 doses of measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to Texas through an immunization program.
Officials say about 95% of those measles cases were among groups who were unvaccinated with the measles shots and 3% were among people who were "under-vaccinated," meaning they hadn't had a complete round of the vaccines, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
A case of measles has turned up in Austin, but the mayor said Friday he doesn't believe it's related to the current West Texas outbreak.
Houston's chief medical officer Dr. David Persse urges caution and calm: "This is absolutely not the time for anybody to panic or overreact; this is the time for folks who think they're not vaccinated, or know they're not vaccinated to go ahead and get vaccinated."
But the Texas Department of Health calls on health professionals to remain vigilant, saying thousands of children may have been exposed to measles, and there is one infected person who traveled to San Antonio and San Marcos last week -- and they're expecting more cases to appear soon, possibly in neighboring states like New Mexico.