Many Mennonite community members in West Texas feel “frustrated” and “targeted” by mainstream media coverage of the current measles outbreak, according to Tina Siemens, a Mennonite business owner who lives in Gaines County, Texas. “It’s not just the Mennonites that have measles,” she told The Defender.

Many Mennonite community members in West Texas feel “frustrated” and “targeted” by mainstream media coverage of the current measles outbreak in Gaines County, Texas, Tina Siemens, a Mennonite business owner and award-winning author told The Defender in an exclusive interview today.

“The media spins it as there’s a large panic in our community. I have not seen that — and I get out and about in my community,” said Siemens, an immigrant who has lived in the Seminole, Texas, area since 1977. Seminole is the county seat for Gaines County.

“There’s some frustration, especially that it is so much targeted just to the Mennonites.”

The measles outbreak in West Texas — particularly in Gaines County — garnered mainstream media attention after the Texas Department of State Health Services (Texas DSHS) last week reported what it called “the first death from measles in the ongoing outbreak in the South Plains and Panhandle regions.”

Texas DSHS spokesperson Lara Anton on Feb. 26 told The Associated Press the outbreak’s main concentration of cases has been a “close-knit, under-vaccinated” Mennonite community.

But Siemens said that’s not a fair characterization. “It’s not just Mennonites that have the measles. There are other groups that have measles, but the Mennonites are an easy target.”

The Mennonites in West Texas mostly live on farms where they grow crops, including peanuts and cotton.

Siemens speaks out publicly because she feels called to be a “bridge builder” between immigrants and non-immigrants, she said. She wants the societal contributions of immigrant groups like the Mennonites to be appreciated — and for immigrants not to be targets of blame or poor treatment.

She detailed an instance of a Mennonite mother receiving “unfair” treatment. “I had a very dear lady message me last night,” Siemens said.

The woman was a Mennonite mother who had recently gone to her doctor’s office for a regular checkup.

The mother told Siemens the office staff demanded that she put on a mask right away because they could tell from her dress and accent that she was a Mennonite from Seminole, where the measles outbreak was strongest.

Meanwhile, other people who came into the office who did not look or sound like Mennonites were not instructed to wear a mask.

Siemens said the mother was then verbally “battered” by medical staff who told her, “You need to vaccinate. You need to vaccinate. You’re not a good mom if you’re not vaccinating.”

That kind of treatment is disrespectful and unfair, Siemens said.

Siemens said it’s not just the unvaccinated that are getting measles in West Texas. On Feb. 21, the Seminole Sentinel ran an article under the headline, “Measles Outbreak Now Includes Vaccinated Population.”

Parents who choose not to vaccinate kids aren’t uneducated

According to Siemens, “The media is portraying the unvaccinated as uneducated” and reporting that because they decline the vaccine, “they are the ones that are carrying all of the measles outbreak.”

“That is just not the truth,” she said.

The parents she knows who chose not to have their children receive the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine studied the vaccine’s risks, Siemens said. “They did more reading than those who say, ‘My doctor says [to get the shot], and I’m going to listen to my doctor.’”

There is evidence of serious health risks linked to the MMR vaccine. For instance, researchers in 2004 found that boys vaccinated with their first MMR vaccine on time were 67% more likely to get diagnosed with autism compared to boys who got their first vaccine after their 3rd birthday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that children receive their first dose of the MMR vaccine between 12 and 15 months old.

Research also shows that the MMR vaccine causes febrile seizures, anaphylaxis, meningitis, encephalitis, thrombocytopenia, arthralgia and vasculitis.

Over the past 10 years, there have been 41 deaths following MMR or MMRV vaccination reported in the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

Reports in VAERS are not necessarily verified and vary in completeness. However, underreporting is a known and serious disadvantage of the VAERS system. Researchers previously determined that the number of injuries reported to VAERS is less than 1%.

Additionally, the MMR vaccine contains virus levels significantly higher than those originally safety tested in the version of the vaccine approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — and the current vaccine has never been tested for safety, according to the legal testimony of Dr. David Kessler, former head of the FDA.

Siemens said she was vaccinated when she entered the U.S. in 1977 as an immigrant. “Did my parents study what was in the vaccines? No, they didn’t. But in 1977 versus 2025, that spectrum has changed a lot.”

Vaccines today are not what they were in 1977, she said. “And thanks to COVID, the trust has just diminished to almost non-existence.”

What’s most important is people’s right to choose

Siemens has worked with “those who choose to vaccinate and those who choose not to vaccinate …They have equal rights in our country.”

What’s most important is that we respect people’s right to choose for themselves and their children. “The freedom of choice is powerful,” she said.

Siemens has assisted the local health department by looking over their translations of community announcements informing people of measles testing sites and the availability of vaccines.

“The Mennonites in Seminole, Texas, all speak German,” she said. “There’s two dialects: a high German, which is the written language, and the low German, which is more the spoken language.”

The CDC today announced on X that it is now on the ground in Texas, too.

The CDC is partnering with the Texas DSHS to respond to the state’s measles outbreak.

Siemens said she has been in touch with the parents of the child who died after testing positive for measles. She confirmed that the child who died was a 6-year-old girl and that the family is part of the “broader community” of Gaines County.

Siemens also said that details surrounding the child’s death have been shared with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and will later be made public.

“This story is going to be told in much more detail when the time is right.” For now, she said, “Just know that this family is being loved on by our community.”

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