Lack of Student Vaccinations Puts Schools and Communities at Risk
A user-friendly website is giving parents a crash-course and some schools a failing grade when it comes to 2013-2014 vaccinations against diseases such as measles and pertussis or whooping cough.
“So, 41 percent of the parents of those kids have made the decision to put the entire school and entire community at risk,” said Dr. Charity Thoman, public health officer for Santa Barbara County Public Health. “I’m not going to mince words over this.”
Thoman is pointing out so-called “danger zones” — local schools that fall below an up-to-date vaccination rate of at least 90 percent — under the state website shotsforschool.org.
Her focus was on kindergarten data.
“Let’s say I have a kindergartner who has diabetes .. or went on chemotherapy,” said Thoman. “I might want to look at this map before I decide where to send him to school.”
Three letters give Thoman cause for concern: P-B-E, which stand for Personal Belief Exemption. This allows parents the right to forgo vaccinations for their school children.
Thoman said she warned school administrators over the summer that these numbers were coming.
The website lists immunization rates for each school in Santa Barbara County. Colored icons indicate a school’s status: Red symbolizes “Most Vulnerable” (less than 70% of students fully vaccinated); Green represents “Safest” (95-100% of students fully vaccinated).
“These schools in the red, these students are at risk of becoming infected with a vaccine preventable disease if even one kid in the school gets it,” said Thoman.
The health officer clicks through the “Most Vulnerable” and “More Vulnerable” zones.
“It breaks it down by disease. So this is really scary.”
The numbers show less than 48 percent of Roosevelt Elementary School kindergartners are protected against measles.
“Remember, below 90 percent is danger zone,” said Thoman.
NewsChannel 3 contacted Dr. Ronzone, the principal at Roosevelt for comment, but she referred us to Dr. Thoman.
El Montecito School on Calle Pinon also falls in the red with a 50 percent “Up to Date” or UTD rate. Montecito Union fared better but still fell far from what’s considered “safe” at nearly 71 percent.
Tammy Murphy, superintendent of the Montecito Union School District, sent NewsChannel 3 a statement: “I understand fully the concerns and questions being raised over vaccinations, specifically a growing trend of parents opting to not vaccinate their children, but the district is legally obligated to recognize and honor this parental right. We work to monitor, through thoughtful observation, our children’s health in order to take good care of our students and the overall health of our classrooms. As both an educator and a parent, I believe the questions raised by this growing topic of concern should be addressed to public health officials.”
Thoman hopes having these numbers on a public website will put pressure on the parents who believe it is in their child’s best interest not to be vaccinated.
“There’s a misconception among parents that the decison to opt out of vaccination only effects their child,” said Thoman. “The truth is, when a parent opts out of vaccines for their child, they’re making a decision to put the entire school, entire community at risk.”
Interestingly, the majority of parents filing for PBE are well-off and educated, according to Thoman.
Harding, Franklin, Cleveland and McKinley Elementary are among the green or “safest” schools, where nearly 100 percent of the students are fully vaccinated.
Assembly Bill 2109 went into effect at the start of the year and requires parents refusing to have their children innoculated meet with a healthcare provider to go over the risks before filing their school vaccination forms.
Health officials say because of that, some parents are being swayed to vaccinate their children.
“Just having a conversation with a healthcare provider is convincing parents that there is no risk of autism,” said Thoman. “And you need to protect not just the child but entire community.”
