Two reports allege that US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. personally ordered the deletion of two measles deaths from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's public data, even though CDC staff had already reviewed and accepted that the deaths were measles-related. Reuters reported that Kennedy instructed new CDC director Erica Schwartz to remove the deaths, which she did without objection, while separate reporting from Inside Medicine found the two deaths remain recorded in an internal CDC database used by state and local health officials, indicating the agency is still tracking them privately while withholding the figures from the public.

The deaths, of a newborn and a child, were briefly published and then removed from the CDC's website within hours on 30 August, following reports from Pennsylvania health officials, where an ongoing outbreak has now sickened 540 people, including 119 in the past week. The CDC's public note initially acknowledged the deaths but now states the available information does not confirm measles as the cause, despite Pennsylvania's health department insisting it supplied all required data. The episode follows a public clash between Kennedy and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, after which Kennedy spread vaccine misinformation and suggested without evidence that the state had "fabricated" the deaths; the Department of Health and Human Services has not explained what information it says is missing.