Skip to main content
An East Portland grocery store. A West Linn cafe. A hospital emergency department waiting room.
In recent days, someone—or perhaps multiple people—with measles has been in all of these places, according to the Oregon Health Authority.
Officials last week made the first announcement this year of an event in which people in Multnomah County may have been exposed to the virus. Then, on Tuesday and Wednesday, the Oregon Health Authority followed up with a wave of new alerts that measles has made more recent appearances in the Portland area too.
According to officials, the times and places where people might have been exposed are:
- WinCo Foods, 2511 SE 1st St., Gresham, between 2 and 5 pm Saturday, March 7.
- Pho.Com, 316 N Main Ave., Gresham, between 4 and 6:30 pm Wednesday, March 25.
- Lark Cafe, 1980 Willamette Falls Drive, #120, West Linn, between noon and 3 pm Friday, March 27.
- Emergency department waiting room, Providence Portland Medical Center, 4805 NE Glisan St., between 7:57 and 10:08 pm Monday, March 30.
- Safeway, 2800 SE Hawthorne Blvd.:
- Between 8 am and 6 pm Thursday, March 26.
- Between 2 pm and midnight Friday, March 27.
- Between 2:20 and 6 pm Saturday, March 28.
- Between 2 pm and midnight Sunday, March 29
The Oregon Health Authority defines an “exposure” as an instance when someone spends any time without respiratory protection in an air space where someone with an infectious measles case is, or was, present in the past two hours, spokeswoman Erica Heartquist tells WW.
Agency officials urge people who were at these locations during these dates and times to “immediately contact your health care provider and let them know they may have been exposed to someone who has measles.” The provider, it adds, “can determine whether you are immune to measles based on your vaccination record, age, or laboratory evidence of prior infection.”
Officials also say people with symptoms of measles not to arrive unannounced at a medical office if they have a measleslike rash—or have been exposed to measles within the previous 21 days and have any other symptom of measles, such as fever, cough or red eyes.
The contagious airborne virus can be dangerous for some people, like children and those with weakened immune systems, though officials say that people with up-to-date vaccinations have “very low” risk of getting severely sick.
It is unclear to what extent measles is actually present in Multnomah County. As of the two-week period ending March 14, Multnomah County wastewater showed “very low” levels of measles, according to state officials. As of the two-week period ending March 28, the state says none was detected in wastewater.
The OHA did not immediately respond to questions about how to reconcile the wastewater reports with the exposure reports.
As of January, state data shows that 95% of Oregon children had at least one dose of the measles vaccine, while 93% were “up to date”—which for children above 6 means they had two. The rates are the same in Multnomah County. The commonly cited number for “herd immunity” is 95%.
Oregon is not alone with its measles cases. Once considered eradicated from the U.S. owing to high vaccination rates, the virus has been on a comeback tour lately. The were 2,285 confirmed cases of measles and three deaths in the U.S. in 2025, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
The U.S. is on pace to have far more measles cases this year. In 2026, as of March 26, the CDC said, the nation had seen 1,575 confirmed cases.
