In the United States, health mandates traditionally have been tempered by the need to allow people to make personal choices.
Thus, parents retain the right to exempt their children from laws that require them to undergo certain vaccinations before attending public schools. In Utah, they may do so for three reasons: medical necessity (that is, conditions that would put the student at risk of severe reactions), and either personal or religious beliefs.
The last two are particularly easy to claim. People claiming religious exemptions don’t need to show proof of membership in any denomination or provide any other evidence. That is as it should be. The freedom to exercise religious beliefs is a fundamental right guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution.
For decades these exemptions have not resulted in any threat to the general health and well-being of students. Lately, however, more Utahns are claiming them, mirroring trends nationwide.
Exemptions on the rise
According to the Utah Department of Health and Human Services, exemptions are on the rise, accounting for 10.1% of all in-person kindergarten students in Utah last school year. The trend is higher in rural areas than in urban ones.
The target for protecting the community against measles, for example, is a 95% immunization rate. That is enough to provide protection for 5% who, for whatever reason, do not get vaccinated.
The recently released American Family Survey, which is a collaboration between Brigham Young University’s Wheatley Institute, Deseret News and BYU’s Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy, found that 68.1% of Americans nationwide believe vaccines should be required for schoolchildren as a public health issue. Only 20.5% believe it is a personal choice, with the rest saying they don’t know.
The sentiment crosses political lines, although fewer Republicans (53.6%) than Democrats (86.4%) and independents (59.2%) support required vaccinations.
The survey report said, “Support for dropping vaccine requirements rarely attracts more than one-third support among any group and it is never more popular than keeping the requirements.”
However, the steady rise in exemptions is a health concern.
Because the state cannot infringe on a person’s right to believe or to worship as he or she pleases, the only option in fighting this trend is education. That, and perhaps a pivot toward more high-tech vaccines that could increase public trust.
Unfortunately, the political process often provides more confusion than light on this issue. The recent Senate hearing for Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a good example.
Spreading confusion
Senators from both parties attacked Kennedy for his stances on vaccinations. The secretary stood firm. But after the hearing, President Trump responded to reporter questions this way:
“I think you have to be very careful when you say that some people don’t have to be vaccinated,” Trump said of Kennedy’s opposition to vaccine mandates for children during a session with reporters in the Oval Office, according to Axios. “They’re just, pure and simple — they work. They’re not controversial at all. And I think those vaccines should be used.”
Last week, the Florida surgeon general announced an effort to end all of that state’s vaccine requirements for school enrollment. The Washington Post quoted an Alabama lawmaker saying he hopes to do the same in his state, too. No doubt, many conservative states are making similar plans.
Clarity from our leaders and good science is important.
COVID vaccine problems
Writing in the Wall Street Journal this week, Michael Segal, a neurologist and neuroscientist, said the rapidly produced mRNA COVID-19 vaccines saved many lives, but “politicians and public-health authorities squandered public trust by sweeping under the rug three serious limitations.”
These, he wrote, were that the vaccine targeted a single protein, it didn’t stop the spread of the disease by extending to mucous membranes, and it elevated the risks of serious inflammation with each shot a person received.
These concerns led some people to skip the vaccines, but they also led some to mistakenly project those concerns to other, time-tested vaccines that use live and weakened forms of viruses which, he said, are safer than mRNA vaccines.
He suggests pivoting, with the help of technology, “to create new live attenuated vaccines as rapidly as we produced mRNA vaccines.”
We’re not sure a public that sometimes is unreasonably skeptical about science would be mollified by such a move, but we welcome any attempt to bolster faith in time-tested vaccines and to reduce exemptions that threaten public health.
The bad old days
As we have said before, only the oldest Americans today can recall the terror that childhood diseases — from measles to polio — once instilled in the hearts of parents. In the early to mid-20th century, nearly every American household was affected in some way by these. Before 1963, much of the U.S. population had contracted measles. At its peak, thousands died from it. Whooping cough, diphtheria, rubella and polio also were widespread.
Vaccines virtually eliminated these diseases. That was one of the most significant achievements in the history of public health.
Health officials in Utah and the rest of the United States must do all they can to prevent those bad times from reoccurring.