Some children have compromised immune systems or diseases that prevent vaccines. However, more and more, families cite “religious” or “personal” reasons to give up vaccination.
That type of excuse has been repeatedly encouraged by Kennedy, who says that vaccination is a “personal choice.”
The HHS has notified schools and clinics that they receive federal money from the Vaccines For Children program, which provides free shots for children without insurance or insufficient insurance, which would be required to recognize any “religious and conscience exemptions to vaccine mandates.”
Bill Winfrey, vice president of policies and strategic initiatives in Saint Louis Integrated Health Network, a non -profit organization that works to address health disparities, believes that doubts about the safety of vaccines planted by the “most reliable health officials in the country” are partly guilty.
“In a situation of doubt, it is easier to be inactive. It is easier to say: ‘Well, if there is any questions, I will simply do it,” he said.
For most of the almost 20% of Kindergarten children who have not had their full schedule of shooting, their families have never requested an exemption; Children are simply inadequately immunized.
‘Measles can be deadly’
Kimberly Jones, a five -year -old mother who lives in a vibrant and diverse area south of the St. Louis downtown, was careful to ensure that her four older children were completely vaccinated. Any shot that their pediatrician recommended that children obtain them in time. All were healthy.
However, his point of view on vaccines changed when his youngest son, Za’riyah, 4, stopped knowing typical development milestones around the moment he received her first MMR shot in 2023.
Za’riyah has been diagnosed with autism. Although there is no scientific evidence that links the MMR vaccine with disorders such as autism, Jones, 44, said that the dramatic increase in the diagnoses of autistic spectrum disorder in the last two decades asks questions if the shots have changed in some way.
“I no longer trust any vaccine, old or new,” Jones said.
Baleyjack of the public schools of Saint Louis said that more parents have shared their concerns about autism and vaccines in recent years.
“Usually, I only use my own personal story to say: ‘Do you know what? I have a child with autism. I don’t believe that your autism has been caused by immunization,” he said. “There is no research to support it.”
Some have changed their minds. Others have not done so. “And that’s fine,” he said. “I just want you to have precise information.”
Baleyjack’s goal for the next school year is to reach a vaccination rate of 80% within public schools, still well below the immunity of the flock, but an improvement, by educating parents and increasing school access to vaccines and general medical care.
“Measles can be deadly,” he said. “That is what scares.”
Do you have a weapon in your home?
For St. Louis’s parents, Emily Pratt, 39, and her husband, Ryan Pratt, 41, decline vaccination rates are causes of alarm.
His little daughter, Lucy, has a rare autoimmune disease called youth dermatomyositis, or JDM, which leaves her almost helpless against minor diseases. She is taking medications to suppress her hyperactive immune system to attack her body.
That means Lucy has little or no ability to fight even a common cold.
“We have four children. If one of them brings a cold home, they are better in three days,” said Emily Pratt. But Lucy “has a cold for two weeks. He gets sick more than typical children.”
