Mike Magee
In the ongoing global debate, from the Pope on down the line, on the safety and ethical implications of AI, one point on which most experts agree is that AI’s behavior is a reflection of the human content it is fed.
Human masters imperfections, including their “situational ethics,” lying, and reckless pursuit of success, telling masters what they want to hear, as well as their willingness to collaborate in advancing a group goal (even at times at the risk of sacrificing their own existence) has already bleed into the AI agents DNA. This is not reassuring. How low can humans go?
Consider our recent non-cooperative performance with the measles epidemic in Pennsylvania. The latest numbers clearly demonstrate that measles is out of control. There have been 943 confirmed cases in Pennsylvania statewide and 5 deaths. Country wide, the U.S. has already exceeded record high numbers that occurred 35 years ago.
This reality has led experts to challenge that measles is in the rear view mirror any longer. BIO, the Biotechnology Innovation Organization, is alarmed. Vaccine Policy Steering Committee member, David Dodd (the CEO of Geovax), threw cold water this week on the “measles free” banner that RFK Jr. and other anti-vaxers have raised in the past. He said, “The status is a signed piece of paper, but the fact that we’re having all these outbreaks means we’ve lost our status.”
How low can we go. Consider Trump’s White House statement on September 18th in which he labeled Pennsylvania’s Governor Shapiro “incompetent.” Or Shapiro taking the bait and firing back on “X” – “Incompetence is standing right behind you, Mr. President,” referring to the posted image of RFK Jr. and Dr. Oz standing obediently behind the President.
For leaders in the Public Health community, it is jarring indeed for top leaders to expend energy throwing childish insults back and forth – especially when it comes to Measles.
We’ve known about the disease for a long, long time. The first published account dates back to Persia in the 9th century. It’s connection to a blood-born infectious agent was confirmed by Scottish physician, Francis Home, in 1757.
By 1912, the US Public Health Service deemed it a serious enough threat that reporting was now required. Over the next decade, 6000 cases on average were reported each year. This was in part because the measles virus is one of the most easily transmitted diseases on the planet. By mid-century, 3 to 4 million people were infected each year, and approximately 50,000 were hospitalized and 500 died.
The first effective vaccine was licensed in 1963 by John Enders, and further refined in 1968. By 1989, it became clear that a booster would be required to reinforce waning immunity to the disease. By 2000, measles was declared eliminated thanks to an effective immunization program which reached 91% of the US population. But lax vaccination 8 years later led to an outbreak of the disease.
Three or more cases in the same locale at the same time constitutes an outbreak. The first 2025 outbreak was reported by the Texas Department of State Health Services in West Texas in late January, 2025. By August, 2025, 762 cases had been confirmed. Ninety-nine of the patients had been hospitalized. There were two fatalities in school-aged children who lived in Gaines County, Texas. The children were not vaccinated and had no known underlying conditions.
Since the Texas outbreak, there were 2,289 cases in 48 outbreaks in 2025, and 3,659 confirmed measles cases reported by 47 jurisdictions so far in 2026 according to the CDC.
Measles vaccine is included in MMR vaccine and MMRV vaccine; MMRV is only licensed for children 1–12 years old. CDC recommends children receive 2 doses of MMR vaccine. But this week’s Reuters poll shows that confidence in the safety of the vaccine has declined to 76%, with only 19% approving of Trump’s handling of the crisis.
As for citizens – confused, angry, and close to disgusted with the state of our leadership – FirstRead, which describes itself as “The must read daily newsletter for PA’s political community,” put it this way, “Gov. Josh Shapiro and U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. again traded online barbs this week, with the governor calling Kennedy ‘incompetent’ and Kennedy blasting Shapiro for declining federal assistance for Pennsylvania’s measles outbreak as the state marked disturbing new milestones – including the largest measles death toll reported in America since the 1990s.”
While experts may be right that AI is on track “to kill us all in the next decade,” perhaps before it does that it might send our leaders one simple message on their management of this epidemic: “Get your act together!”
