Amid Wisconsin measles cases, Milwaukee Health Department running simulations to prepare for additional outbreaks

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Milwaukee's Health Department is not letting down its guard after nine measles cases were reported in Oconto County. They're running simulations so they're as prepared as possible when the cases hit.

Dr. Michael Totoraitis is the commissioner of the Milwaukee Health Department. At a Board of Health meeting Wednesday, August 6, he said, "The chance of it coming into the state was really high."

Wisconsin's measles cases did not surprise him, especially with a Canadian outbreak relatively nearby.

He said the Health Department planned for this moment, running simulations of an outbreak, and the department's response. "'What would happen if this happens?' And then we add different injects, or audibles, into the planning to say 'hey, if all of the sudden we don't have enough people to do contact tracing, what's our plan there?'"

They ran one simulation among their own team, then another with regional health authorities.

Preparation is crucial because of the risk of exposure. Three times more contagious than COVID, 30% of people experience complications. In some cases, people die.

When the last confirmed case happened in Milwaukee back in October of 2023, more than 800 people were exposed.

But convincing people to get vaccinated has so far been difficult.

Wisconsin's vaccination rate is the third lowest in the country, according to the Health Department.

Totoraitis said, "Our team has been planning different mobile clinics to different schools across the city."

The city has 800 MMR vaccine doses to offer for free. And if the demand is there, they can easily get additional doses any time.

Children are particularly susceptible to measles. But more than 280,000 Wisconsin kindergarteners are not protected.

Just 56% of MPS kindergarteners in the state's largest school district have met the minimum requirements for the MMR vaccine, near the very bottom of the list of all districts in the state.

The three measles deaths in Texas so far this year were all unvaccinated children.

Totoraitis told us, "Had the parents chosen to vaccinate their children, those children would be alive today. And that is a really, really tough thing for me to try and rationalize as a parent."

Right now, the Health Department is using a federal grant to buy the MMR vaccine doses and provide them for free.

But Dr. Totoraitis said it could be a very different conversation if that funding is threatened. For now, however, he's confident that grant is stable.