Pro-vaccine advocates are trying to build support for a bill that would get rid of religious exemptions for routine childhood vaccine requirements in Massachusetts’ schools.
Lawmakers held a legislative briefing at the State House on Tuesday about two bills that would remove the non-medical exemption from vaccine requirements as well as improve data collection on immunization rates in Massachusetts.
“Especially with the measles outbreak in Texas, and the national environment being a bit more hostile to vaccines, we feel like this is the time for Massachusetts to kind of protect itself and take a stand and pass this really strong legislation,” said Katie Blair, director of Massachusetts Families for Vaccines. Blair says the grassroots, volunteer-led network advocates for public health and science-based policy related to vaccines.
Rep. Andy Vargas, a Democrat from Haverhill, first filed the bill in 2019 when a constituent with an immunocompromised child expressed fear of sending their child to school knowing that parents can exempt their child from vaccinations for non-medical reasons.
Currently, children in kindergarten through 12th grade are required to be immunized or vaccinated against several diseases , including polio and the measles. But parents can opt their children out of vaccinations for either medical or religious reasons. According to Massachusetts Families for Vaccines, “religious” exemptions in the state have risen by 500% since the 1980s, despite people’s religious affiliations going down.
“This is one concrete thing that we can do here in the commonwealth to ensure that we prevent preventable diseases,” Vargas said. He told GBH News that, in previous sessions, the legislation did not make it out for a vote in time.
Dr. Richard Moriarty, a professor of clinical pediatrics at University of Massachusetts Medical School, spoke to lawmakers at the briefing.
“I’m very concerned with the new people who are in charge of our health care. And I’m very concerned that we have a major measles outbreak with multiple deaths in another state,” he said, referring to the roughly 250 cases concentrated in Texas. “We’re a plane ride away, and we have a number of communities in our state that are significantly under-immunized.”
Moriarty says the legislation does two things: It keeps better track of immunizations in schools, and removes the religious exemption for school vaccines.
“Right now, somewhere in the vicinity of almost 40% of schools either don’t report their results, or they are such small schools that they’re reported in three-year rolling averages,” Moriarty said. “There is no organized religion that preaches against vaccines, and we want to make sure that people are not using their religious exemption as something else.”
Dr. John Snyder, a pediatrician and a member of the Massachusetts chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics also spoke at the legislative briefing to help field questions on the childhood vaccinations.
He took one question about Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. touting vitamin A as a potential way to help those who have contracted measles . In an opinion piece earlier this month, Kennedy said that “while there is no approved antiviral for those who may be infected ... studies have found that vitamin A can dramatically reduce measles mortality.”
“There is no cure for measles and there is no treatment for measles,” Snyder said. “Vitamin A is often given in very high doses to very ill people with measles and measles complications if they have vitamin A deficiency, which is more prevalent in some parts of the world. If you do not have a vitamin A deficiency, vitamin A does absolutely nothing for your measles infection.”
GBH News reached out to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services but a spokesperson did not immediately respond.
The two bills are currently in the Joint Committee on Public Health. Vargas co-sponsors the bill with Reps. Mindy Domb and Sam Montaño. The Senate version of the bill is sponsored by Sens. Edward Kennedy and James Eldridge.
