Over the objections of pediatricians and infectious-disease specialists, Florida health officials took initial steps Friday to do away with certain vaccine mandates for schoolchildren.
Physicians and educators spoke out against the proposed repeal of vaccination requirements for diseases such as chickenpox during a Department of Health workshop in Panama City Beach, while vaccine critics applauded Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration for advancing the plan.
The proposal includes removing vaccination requirements for hepatitis B; varicella, commonly known as chickenpox; Haemophilus influenza type b, or Hib, which can cause meningitis; and pneumococcal conjugate, which can cause pneumonia and meningitis. Other vaccination requirements mandated by state law for school entry — including for polio, diphtheria, rubeola, rubella, mumps and tetanus — would remain in place.
DeSantis and state Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo in September announced the plan to do away with certain vaccine requirements.The requirements targeted in Friday’s proposal are in state rules, which the Department of Health can go through a process to change.
Because the other vaccination requirements are in state law, the Legislature would need to approve any changes. Ladapo has said he would work with the Legislature to eliminate the requirements in law.
The vast majority of health care professionals who appeared at Friday’s meeting vehemently opposed the plan to repeal requirements. Critics said it would turn back the clock on medical advancements.
“I want to make this clear and loud. I want everyone to know how serious matters are. Just in the past six months, we’ve had two patients in the ICU with Hib. One child, unfortunately, succumbed at four months of age. No vaccines,” Panama City pediatrician Eehab Kenawy said.
A two-year-old who was never vaccinated also arrived at the hospital with “abscesses in the brain,” seizures and was “quote, unquote, brain dead,” according to Kenawy. The child’s mother pleaded with doctors to “give my child every vaccine you can,” the pediatrician told a Department of Health panel taking public input on the proposal.
Kenawy said religious exemptions already exist to allow parents and guardians to opt out of vaccinations for their children.
“You’re not forced. But sending a message to the general public that vaccines are not important, vaccines are not needed, is not the way to do it,” Kenawy said.
Opposition to vaccine mandates has surged after the COVID-19 pandemic, with state leaders such as Ladapo and DeSantis among the most high-profile critics of their efficacy. Ladapo in September pledged to eliminate all of the state’s vaccine requirements for schoolchildren.
“All of them. All of them. Every last one of them is wrong and drips with disdain and slavery,” the state’s top doctor said on Sept. 3.
Simone Chriss, a civil-rights attorney for Gainesville-based Southern Legal Counsel, asked health officials Friday whether they had consulted with national medical experts when crafting the proposal.
“The (proposed) rule language is grounded in policy based on considerations that favor parental rights and medical freedom,” Emma Spencer, the Department of Health’s division director for public health statistics and performance management, responded.
The proposal also would expand exemptions for other vaccinations. Currently, parents or guardians can request waivers from vaccination requirements when “immunizations are in conflict with my religious tenets or practices.” The draft rule would add exemptions for “a sincerely held moral or ethical belief.”
Paul Arons, a family medicine physician based in Tallahassee, urged state officials to maintain the status quo and said he was “alarmed” by Ladapo’s advocacy for eliminating all vaccination requirements.
“The surgeon general has likened the obligation to protect oneself and others from vaccine-preventable diseases to slavery, and has cast doubts on the efficacy of some of these vaccines, rather than celebrating their benefits and urging their maximum deployment. … I’m here to beseech you, please do not change this rule which will set in motion the dismantling of the successful lifesaving system of public health,” Arons, a former medical director of the Department of Health’s Bureau of HIV/AIDS, said.
But Susan Sweetin, chief marketing officer for the National Vaccine Information Center, was among speakers in support of the proposal. Sweetin said her son was injured by a vaccine given to him at birth and said some pediatricians are refusing to treat children who are unvaccinated.
“This is not informed consent. That is coercion. Vaccines should never be tied to a child’s education. Nothing that pierces the skin should ever be used as leverage over a child’s opportunity to education and to learn. I thank the Florida health department for proposing the removal of vaccine mandates and for recognizing that parental rights and informed consent must guide these guidelines,” Sweetin said.
The proposal also would allow parents, guardians and college and university applicants ages 18 to 23 to opt out of participating in a statewide database, known as the Florida SHOTS program, that collects vaccination information. Health officials said they would accept public comments on the proposed rule changes until Dec. 22.
Michael Haller, a University of Florida professor who is a pediatrician, submitted a paper and a formal resolution on behalf of the school’s College of Medicine Faculty Council reflecting concerns.
“For pediatricians, this is not partisan. It is a medical and public-health issue with well-documented consequences. Decades of data from the United States and internationally show that weakening or removing school vaccine requirements lead to lower immunization rates. When vaccination rates fall, herd immunity is lost. And when herd immunity is lost, we see the return of serious and sometimes fatal diseases, measles, pertussis, mumps, pneumococcal disease and others,” Haller said. “If Florida removes school vaccine requirements, the outcomes are predictable: increased preventable infectious disease, more hospitalizations, especially among infants, immunocompromised children and medically fragile adults.”
–Dara Kam, News Service of Florida
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