Lancaster County Commissioner Josh Parsons accused Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania of engaging in “deception” when he held a news conference and said two unvaccinated people died from “measles-associated” deaths in the county.
During the Tuesday news conference, Shapiro, considered a 2028 presidential hopeful, alleged that Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was spreading vaccine misinformation and tied it to the deaths of two people in Lancaster County.
“There’s real life consequences to spreading misinformation. There are real-life consequences to scaring people and not relying on actual doctors and actual medical professionals to provide unbiased information to parents so that we can make reasonable decisions for our kids,” the governor recounted that he said in a phone call with Kennedy earlier in the day.
.@GovernorShapiro calls out RFK Jr. for spreading misinformation and dangerous rhetoric surrounding vaccines:
“I made very clear that his actions and the rhetoric that’s coming from this Administration are having a negative impact on communities… that there’s real-life… pic.twitter.com/5xWCEMR1ZV
— Pennsylvania Governor’s Office (@PAGovOffice) August 25, 2026
Parsons, a Republican, responded Thursday with a lengthy post on X, writing, “Officials at the Governor’s press conference used the term ‘measles-associated’ (see press conference and accompanying press release) but clearly framed it as deaths FROM measles.”
“The Governor stated that these are the first two measles-associated deaths in the U.S. in 35 years. People died FROM measles 35 years ago. Therefore, it would not be accurate to make that statement unless these current cases were in fact being presented as deaths attributable to measles in some significant way,” the county official continued.
“This appears to be a carefully crafted attempt to overstate the case, while also maintaining some later wiggle room, i.e. ‘associate’ to muddy the issue if it became clear these were not in fact measles deaths. This indicates deception,” Parsons asserted.
He went on to note that he spoke with the Lancaster County Coroner, Dr. Stephen Diamantoni, who said there had been no measles deaths reported in the county.
This is a long post, but I think it is important for anyone who wants to get to the bottom of what is happening here in Lancaster County.
On Tuesday Aug 25th Governor Shapiro and officials from the PA Dept of Health and Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health held a press…
— Commissioner Josh Parsons (@CommissionerJP) August 27, 2026
“I announced this publicly to be transparent. Neither the Governor’s Office nor Penn Medicine replied to my questions. The law requires deaths from contagious disease such as measles to be reported to the Coroner,” Parsons wrote.
“The Coroner then released information that an infant had died during a home birth and the infant tested positive for measles but did not die of measles,” he noted.
“State officials then point to deceased infant: State officials, who previously refused to give any information on the two deceased individuals (other [than] they were unvaccinated) then pointed to the infant as one of the cases. (See DOH statement of 8/26/27),” Parsons wrote.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, children generally do not receive their first measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine until they are 12 to 15 months old, so Shapiro’s allegation that Kennedy caused vaccine hesitancy would not have applied in this case.
Further, the HHS secretary pointed out at a news conference in Tampa following Shapiro’s accusation on Tuesday, “Our advice is that people should get the measles vaccination,” adding, “There are certain communities and certain religious communities that do not want to do that, and we want to take care of those kids as well,” Politico reported. The MMR vaccine is among the 11 that HHS recommended in guidelines published in January.
Parsons continued in his X post, “’Lancaster County Coroner Steve Diamantoni said the cause of death was not from the measles. The newborn died shortly after birth from a laceration of the spleen, although measle antibodies were present in postmortem testing…’ (Coroner interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer).”
The county commissioner next highlighted, “The framing of this, or underlying assertion in it, seemed to be to indicate that the deceased person was unvaccinated by choice. This shows intent on the part of officials to deceive. Announcing a technically true statement, but keeping secret the context which would show there was no possible way for the baby to have been vaccinated before its death is deliberately deceptive.”
Parsons then noted, “We still know nothing about the second reported death. There has not even been an effort, to my knowledge, to explain this death or provide any details whatsoever — beyond ‘unvaccinated.’ Again, under the law any death due to measles would be required to be reported to the County Coroner. He has no report.”
He concluded, “Given the other apparent deception here it is fair to ask whether the facts of the second case have been materially manipulated similar to the first case, or whether the second case exists at all.”
Politico reported on Wednesday that Shapiro’s office and the Pennsylvania Health Department said in an emailed statement that the department “uses the term ‘measles-associated’ when laboratory or epidemiologic evidence of measles is present, but the disease may not be assessed by the medical certifier or coroner to be the immediate cause of death.”
“The department confirmed that one of the two deaths is the one Parsons referred to: an infant with a positive measles test,” Politico added.
“Due to patient confidentiality, the PA DOH will not be releasing any additional personal information about the two deceased residents from Lancaster County,” the department said.
Parsons argued in a county commissioners meeting this week, “The law does allow for information to be released. It can be released without identifying the individuals, but providing some demographic background information, age, that sort of thing.”
Remind us again, who’s spreading misinformation? https://t.co/Mlu3J4Xut0
— Children’s Health Defense (@ChildrensHD) August 27, 2026
“You don’t get to say that this happened and everything else around it is top secret. You need to articulate enough details for people to know, and then for us to be able to communicate with our constituents, and for people to be able to make decisions based on that information.”
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