Child Vaccination Rates, Already Down Because of COVID, Fall Again

Pew Stateline ^ | January 12, 2023 | Christine Vestal

[DoodleBob]

Child vaccination rates dipped into dangerous territory during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, when schools were shuttered, and most doctors were only seeing emergency patients.

But instead of recovering after schools reopened in 2021, those historically low rates worsened, according to new data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Experts fear that the skepticism of science and distrust of government that flared up during the pandemic are contributing to the decrease.

According to today’s data, the percentage of U.S. children entering kindergarten with their required immunizations fell to 93% in the 2021-22 school year, 2 percentage points below recommended herd immunity levels of 95% and lower than vaccination rates in 2020-21, when many schools and doctor’s offices were closed.

“While 1 percentage point might not seem concerning, that one percent represents tens of thousands of children who are inadequately protected from diseases we can easily prevent through immunization,” said Dr. Michelle Fiscus, chief medical officer at the Association of Immunization Managers, a nonprofit group of state officials who direct vaccination efforts.

“This national trend is alarming, especially as we see outbreaks of measles in Ohio among children who are too young to be vaccinated and those who are inadequately vaccinated. We need all hands on deck to get these children protected,” Fiscus said.

Public health officials warn that unless child vaccination rates for measles, chicken pox, polio and other diseases are quickly brought back to pre-pandemic levels, outbreaks of preventable diseases — like the measles outbreaks in Ohio and Minnesota in the fall and the polio case in New York last summer — are likely to become commonplace.

While COVID-related disruptions in schools and the health care system may be the primary cause for this recent drop in immunization rates, they’re only part of the reason state-required vaccination rates are trending downward, public health experts say.

They say the politicization of public health and increasing distrust of government have skewed parents’ previously positive attitudes about vaccines for measles, mumps, rubella, chicken pox, tetanus, diphtheria, polio and other childhood diseases that have been all but eradicated.

“I’m trembling in my anxiety about this,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.

“Our own success in immunizing children routinely, uniformly against a whole list of diseases that used to be common has resulted in the current generation of moms and dads not knowing much about these diseases, if anything,” he said.

“If you don’t fear the disease and respect the vaccines,” he added, “you may not adhere to state laws requiring them.”

In general, the public’s willingness to follow public health requirements has been waning since the COVID-19 pandemic began, said Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer at the Association of State and Territorial Health Officers.

The political divisiveness that erupted over COVID quarantines, masking and vaccines, he said, may be spilling over into what has been a widely accepted public health policy of protecting children from infectious diseases.

The CDC estimates that vaccinating children born from 1994 to 2018 will prevent 472 million illnesses, nearly 30 million hospitalizations and more than a million deaths. The state-run vaccination programs are also projected to save $479 billion in health care and other direct costs.

In 2019, a single measles outbreak of 72 cases in Washington state cost $3.4 million, CDC researchers estimated, with most of the costs incurred by local public health agencies.

State immunization rates vary widely. For the 2021-22 school year, Alaska, the District of Columbia, Wisconsin, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky and Ohio had the lowest rates. New York, Rhode Island, West Virginia, Delaware, California, Massachusetts and Nebraska had the highest rates.

Changing Mandates

All 50 states and the District of Columbia require children to be vaccinated for childhood diseases before entering kindergarten, whether at a public or private school. Every state allows medical exceptions, and most allow parents to seek an exemption for religious or philosophical reasons.

Public health officials argue that the best way for states to boost their child vaccination rates is to enact ironclad vaccine mandates with no exceptions other than for medical reasons, such as for children who are undergoing cancer therapy. (Emphasis added)

Mississippi and West Virginia, which have such strict vaccine mandates, have had among the highest vaccine rates in the nation for decades.

California did away with its non-medical vaccine exemptions in 2015, followed by Maine and New York in 2019 and Connecticut in 2021. West Virginia’s vaccine mandate never included non-medical exemptions, and Mississippi’s law was stripped of non-medical exemptions in 1979 after the state Supreme Court ruled them unconstitutional.

California repealed its non-medical exemptions in reaction to high-profile measles outbreaks in 2014 and 2015, including one that started at Disneyland. After the law took effect, measles, mumps and rubella coverage rose by 3.3%, which put California closer to the herd immunity vaccination threshold of 95% for measles.

With most state vaccine mandates in place by the 1980s, the CDC declared victory over measles in 2000.

But in recent years, the diagnosis numbers have crept upward: In 2014, 667 measles cases were reported to the CDC. In 2019, state health departments reported 1,274 measles cases.

Even so, childhood vaccination rates in the United States remained high relative to other developed countries, and public attitudes toward routine childhood vaccines were relatively positive.

But since the COVID-19 pandemic began, state vaccine requirements have met more opposition. In October, a poll conducted by the Harvard Opinion Research Program showed that support for vaccination requirements to enter school had slipped to 74%, compared with 84% in 2019.

A similar survey published by the Kaiser Family Foundation in November showed that 28% of respondents said parents should be able to opt out of vaccinating their school-age children even if it results in health risks for others.

That’s up from only 16% who responded the same way in a 2019 poll conducted by the Pew Research Center. (The Pew Charitable Trusts funds the center and Stateline.)

In the past two years, dozens of bills have been proposed that would make it easier for parents to opt out of routine vaccinations for their school-age children, as well as COVID-19 shots, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, which tracks state legislation.

In 2021, Kentucky and Florida enacted laws allowing parents to refuse routine vaccinations and still enroll their children in school.

Enforcement and Access

In addition to tightening vaccination mandates, public health officials say some states need to better enforce their rules and increase education and community messaging, so parents better understand the importance of vaccinating their children.

Measles, for example, is far more contagious than COVID-19. It typically infects 9 out of 10 people an infected person encounters, and the contagion can linger in a room for at least two hours after an infected person leaves.

Although most measles cases resolve within a week, it is a potentially life-threatening respiratory disease that often results in hospitalization. In Ohio, for example, 33 of the 82 children with measles last year were hospitalized.

Dr. Anne Zink, chief medical officer for Alaska’s Department of Health and president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, said improving access to pediatricians, family doctors and other health professionals who can administer childhood vaccines is another way states can get more children vaccinated.

Pediatricians and family doctors typically provide immunization shots to children between 12 and 23 months. But for children who miss their vaccinations in their first two years and need to get caught up, some states set up local vaccine drives at schools and use mobile vaccination units to serve local communities.

Matt Guido, research coordinator for Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel at the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania, said states should consider taking advantage of the infrastructure established for ramping up COVID-19 vaccinations and call on some of the same community leaders to help parents get their kids vaccinated before they start school next year. (Emphasis about dr death panels added)

[DoodleBob]

Let's take a trip down memory lane. Notice the ramp-up after 1980.

TABLE 1. Year of U.S. licensure of selected childhood vaccines

Vaccine Year of first US licensure
Tetanus toxoid 1943
Trivalent inactivated influenza 1945
Tetanus and diphtheria toxoids 1953 for children aged >7 yrs; 1970 for children aged <7 yrs
Inactivated polio 1955
Oral polio 1963
Diphtheria--tetanus--pertussis 1970
Diphtheria--tetanus--acellular pertussis 1991
Measles--mumps--rubella 1963 (measles); 1967 (mumps); 1969 (rubella); 1971 (measles--mumps--rubella combined)
Hepatitis B 1981 (plasma derived); 1986 (recombinant)
Haemophilus influenzae type b conjugate 1987 for children aged ≥18 mos; 1990 for infants
Hepatitis A 1995
Varicella 1995
Pneumococcal conjugate 2000 (7-valent); 2010 (13-valent)
Live attenuated influenza 2003
Tetanus--diphtheria--acellular pertussis 2005
Meningococcal conjugate 2005
Rotavirus 2006
Human papillomavirus 2006

-------------------------------------------------------

And here's where they are in LA County:

How'd we get here? Per the article from which the table originated -

In April 1977, a Childhood Immunization Initiative was announced with two goals: attainment of immunization levels of 90% in the nation's children by October 1979 and establishment of a permanent system to provide comprehensive immunization services to the 3 million children born each year in the United States. Increased funding was provided through Section 317, and a major effort was made to review vaccination records of school children and vaccinate those in need. State and local public health personnel reviewed >28 million records during a 2-year period. In addition, state and local authorities enacted and enforced school immunization requirements. By 1980, all 50 states had such laws, and since 1981, immunization levels of students entering schools have been ≥95%. Thus, the first target of the initiative was met.(emphasis added) Achieving the second target would take considerably longer.

I'm all for health care that...well...cares for health. I'm also for the rights of the individual, am against force and fraud, and for plenary parental rights.

The issue isn't whether injecting all of those elixirs into young bodies is right, wrong, efficacious, or poisonous. However, let's HAVE that discussion. I mean...what do the vaccinated have to fear?

The issue is the rights of PARENTS vs the State. If you oppose progressive educational nonsense and indoctrination, then you MUST oppose mandatory vaccinations for public school.

[ConservativeInPA]

This article is pure propaganda. It’s a great thing that parents are not subjecting their children to experimental gene therapies. There is hope for the continuation of mankind, assuming boys stop feeling like they are girls.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

Most vaccines are unnecessary.
The US is way overboard on sheer number.

[mewzilla]

If parents read this, they might fall even further...

Intracellular Reverse Transcription of Pfizer BioNTech COVID-19 mRNA Vaccine BNT162b2 In Vitro in Human Liver Cell Line

From the conclusion...

...Our study is the first in vitro study on the effect of COVID-19 mRNA vaccine BNT162b2 on human liver cell line. We present evidence on fast entry of BNT162b2 into the cells and subsequent intracellular reverse transcription of BNT162b2 mRNA into DNA.

[mewzilla]

Integrated into the host genome...

Holy ****.

[Jane Long]

Integrated into the host genome...

---

Wait a darn minute.....we REPEATEDLY heard the $hot $hills/FRoctors say that these $hots were extremely safe, effective...and, would not change/alter/integrate into the recipients genome.

[DSH]

Our study is the first in vitro study on the effect of COVID-19 mRNA vaccine BNT162b2 on human liver cell line. We present evidence on fast entry of BNT162b2 into the cells and subsequent intracellular reverse transcription of BNT162b2 mRNA into DNA.

Yes. Potentially the "worst case scenario." Predicted by some as far back as 2020.

[mewzilla]

Now we know why they chose not do the genotoxicity studies.

Or, if they did, why they didn’t make the results public.

[mewzilla]

Related...

mRNA Vaccines: Why Is the Biology of Retroposition Ignored?

[Jane Long]

And....wanted their evil study results kept under lock and key....for 75 years.

[Jane Long]

Ping to posts 4 and 5.

[grey_whiskers]

[DSH]

Related...

mRNA Vaccines: Why Is the Biology of Retroposition Ignored?

Interesting. Thanks for passing this along.

My working assumption for a while now is that the entire mRNA "platform," be it for vaccines (for which, of course, it was not originally developed) or for any other form of focused pharmaceutical treatment, doesn't work. It just doesn't. It's garbage, and quite dangerous garbage at that.

In other words, the mRNA platform is one of those things that looked good on paper -- or, rather, on a computer screen -- but which doesn't actually work in real life. It turned out to be sh*t, that' all. Hey, it happens. Lot of R&D fails in real life.

Problem is, it's a technology that, at this point, is "too big to fail." A lot of people have invested enormous amounts of money, real bet-the-company sums, on the mRNA approach actually working out. And they'd already started counting their expected mega-profits.

These people, being dug-in, would be perfectly happy to kill and maim millions and millions in pursuit of those imagined mega-profits. And they will never, ever stop. They'll have to be stopped.

[momincombatboots]

85 percent of the country blindly obeyed. That is a holocaust level of unquestionable obedience.
Do you think those kinds of people care about science.
Now they have a mandate to gendermander, mutilate and chemically castrate teens without parental consent.

[Clay Moore]

Shockingly, we will also see a drop in Autism. Pure coincidence.

[13foxtrot]

In other words, the mRNA platform is one of those things that looked good on paper -- or, rather, on a computer screen -- but which doesn't actually work in real life. It turned out to be sh*t, that' all. Hey, it happens. Lot of R&D fails in real life.

There are several other issues that may represent evidence of platform breakdown, such as: lipid nano-particles readily breaching blood brain barriers; or significant immune response to LNPs (absent payload).

Great insight. Platform failure -- that's what they are afraid of.

Back in 2018 Fauci was lamenting that they couldn't get mRNA therapies approved -- he joked that we need a pandemic to get them approved and accepted by the public. They were just itching to bring the mRNA platform to market. New treatments for old ailments all under fresh Patents.

Too bad it doesn't work.

[Jane Long]

Not me ;-)

[Paleo Conservative]

My almost 3 year old son was born just before the COVID-19 lockdowns started. He is fully vaccinated on schedule for all the vaccines listed on the CDC childhood vaccination list as it existed when he was born. He has not been vaccinated against COVID-19, but all other family members have been vaccinated against it with various vaccines available in their countries. My wife and I plan to wait til his next scheduled doctor’s appointment to discuss the issue with our son’s pediatrician.

[mewzilla]

BTTT.

[mewzilla]

From late last year...

SARS-CoV-2 Vaccines and Adverse Effects in Gynecology and Obstetrics: The First Italian Retrospective Study

...Symptoms such as delayed menstruation and abnormal uterine bleeding (metrorrhagia, menometrorrhagia, and menorrhagia) were generally reported within the first three weeks of vaccination, especially after the second dose, with a percentage of 23% and 77%, respectively. These preliminary data suggest that this problem may be broader and deserving of further investigation in the future...

Love that last sentence.