It’s official: Premier Danielle Smith can now call herself Queen of Measles.

And not just in Alberta. Try North America.

That’s right. Alberta now leads the continent in a preventable childhood disease that leaves at least two of every 1,000 infections with severe intellectual disabilities, pneumonia or hearing loss. Or dead.

Stunningly, Alberta has already recorded nearly half a dozen cases of measles present at birth in the province.

And every measles infection leaves a child with a disabled immune system, stripped of memory about how to fight other routine infections. As a result, any unvaccinated child who battles measles will probably be sicklier, possibly for years afterwards. Brazilian researchers recently found a high correlation between having measles and later dying of another infectious disease.