The heated battle in the Vermont Legislature over compulsory vaccinations came to an end when lawmakers passed legislation last spring that will allow Vermonters to claim philosophical exemptions to mandatory immunizations, but skirmishes continue two months after the legislation was enacted.
In the latest, public officials and vaccination activists are at impasse over how the law, Act 157, is being implemented.
Jennifer Stella, an activist with Vax Choice Vermont, says she is “shocked” that Vermont Department of Health officials have created new school vaccination forms and educational materials without seeking public comment.
The state had until July 1 to create the information in time for nurses to distribute forms and educational materials to parents before school starts at the end of August. Parents must sign the forms in order to enroll their children in public schools in Vermont.
The Vermont Department of Health failed to implement new immunization requirements during the last session. Dr. Harry Chen, commissioner of the department, wanted to eliminate the “philosophical exemption” for child vaccinations because of concerns about the potential spread of diseases such as mumps, pertussis and measles.
Vax Choice Vermont, led by Stella, succeeded in scuttling the department’s proposal by rallying parents and activists in opposition to the original version of S.199, which was introduced by Sen. Kevin Mullin, R-Rutland. Vax Choice accused lawmakers of doing Big Pharma’s bidding and ignoring the side effects of vaccines, which the group’s members believe caused the recent deaths of two children in Vermont. They have also tied mumps, measles and rubella immunizations to the onset of autism. The latter allegation, based on a fraudulent study, has been broadly debunked by scientists, most recently in a study conducted by the well-respected Institute of Medicine which analyzed 1,000 peer-reviewed articles and came to the conclusion that there was no direct connection between autism and the MMR vaccine, according to a story that appeared in the New York Times in August 2011.
Stella now sees the preservation of the philosophical exemption as a Pyrrhic victory. In the latest salvo, she accuses Commissioner Chen of “skipping” the legislative rule-making process. Stella also alleges that the forms did not undergo a legal review. Her most provocative charge, however, is that the educational materials, which cite references from the Centers for Disease Control among others, appear to be “coercive” and “not at all scientific in nature.”
The department disagrees with Stella’s allegations.
Christine Finley, immunization program chief for the Vermont Department of Health, says public review through the legislative rulemaking process was not required by law. Nor was rule review necessary, she says. The scope of the law was narrow, she says, and explicitly identified what statements had to be included on philosophical exemption form, namely a series of warnings about the impact of not immunizing children on a school community and the time period for provisional admittance (six months) for children attending Vermont schools.
“The Legislature passed very specific language in Act 157 that told us specifically how to do things, and when consulting with leadership we were told no rule change was required in order to implement it because of the specificity in it,” Finley said.
The forms use language from the bill verbatim.
Finley says there also wasn’t time for public review. As it was, nurses had asked for the new forms in June as they prepared for the new school year.
Stella, who has engaged in a back and forth with Finley via email, is unswayed by the department’s arguments. She says the more than 1,500 members of Vax Choice are “a bit miffed” that they didn’t have a chance to weigh in on the form and the educational materials, which she believes should have included references to “evidence-based” scientific articles.
“The wound has been reopened again, and everyone is swirling with their own take on it,” Stella said in an interview. “We were hoping to allow for people to look at risk of infectious disease balanced against risk of particular vaccine.”
On July Fourth, Stella sent out an email blast to members of the anti-vaccine group, asserting that signing the form is an abrogation of First Amendment rights.
It seems that this is no longer an issue over whether vaccines should be compulsory or not — it is now a matter of potentially free speech and the exercise of a Vermonter’s religious rights and legal rights (since an exemption is legal). How many are willing to let this medical political nightmare now open the door to compel a person to read, sign and believe, or else?
Stella takes issue with the department’s two-page educational handout, which in her view gloss over the use of toxins such as mercury and aluminum in vaccines. She said the materials should cite scientific studies.
“We care about what we put in our bodies,” Stella says. “It would be fair enough to allow people to know what is in vaccines.”
Aluminum is used to boost the immune response to the vaccine.The maximum amount of aluminum used in a single diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis vaccine, which is administered to babies and young children, is about the same or less than that found in soy infant formula, according to a review from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
Thimerosal, a vaccine preservative that contains ethylmercury, has not been proven to be a cause of autism, according to a dozen studies cited by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Thimerosal is used for some flu vaccinations, which are not required for children entering school.
Finley argues that the educational materials are based on evidence from widely accepted scientific studies and recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control. Moreover, she says the forms are designed to be read by parents of all educational backgrounds and reading levels. “You wouldn’t want to be asking people to read 16 pages to sign an exemption form,” Finley says.
The Centers for Disease Control warns that if infants and young people aren’t immunized, children could be at risk for contracting preventable diseases that put their health at risk.
“It is not the goal of the CDC to poison children,” Finley said.
Here is the language from the Vermont Department of Health that parents must agree to when they sign a philosophical exemption form:
• I have reviewed and understand the Required Parent Education Information developed by the Vermont Department of Health.
• I understand that failure to complete the required vaccination schedule increases the risk to my child and others of contracting, carrying or spreading a vaccine-preventable infectious disease.
• I understand that there are people with special health needs in schools and child care facilities who are unable to be vaccinated, or who are at heightened risk of contracting a vaccine-preventable communicable disease, and for whom such a disease could be life-threatening.
Correction: We reported that Vax Choice Vermont was anti-vaccine. Stella says that’s not true: Many members of the group have partially vaccinated their children.
