To Vaccinate or Not to Vaccinate? More Parents Opt-Out

Amid increased concerns that vaccinations could do more harm than good for the immune systems of small children, more parents are choosing to opt-out of school inoculation requirements.

Across California, a record number of parents decided to opt-out of required school vaccinations using a 'personal belief' stance, writes the Santa Rosa Press Democrat:

More than 11,000 kindergartners missed at least one vaccine in 2010 because their parents decided to forgo inoculation. At nearly 2.5 percent of the state's 470,000 kindergartners, that's California's highest rate of declined vaccines since at least 1978, the year before the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine was required.

School children are only allowed to opt out of vaccinations by offering up a medical exemption, which requires a doctor’s note and explanation, or a personal belief exemption, which requires merely the tick of a box.

The rates of personal belief exeptions are more than double in Sonoma county, where more than 6 percent of incoming kindergarteners opted-out of their innoculations.

In the Sonoma Valley, schools have been strugling to meet the Sept. 15 deadline _to complete paperwork for district-wide required_ pertussis, or whooping cough, vaccines.  

District staff say over 200 students failed to complete the Sept. 15 deadline, and were called out of class. By Sept. 23, the number was done to a handful.

The new law, which makes a whooping cough vacination mandatory for California school children, was put into effect after a spike in whooping cough infections - over 9,000 were diagnosed in 2010.

Officials also hope that publicity given to the 10 babies who died from whooping cough will encourage parents to opt-in to the mandatory vaccinations.

Meanwhile, community health centers are struggling to keep up with the increased demand.

The , which has seen an almost 6,000-patient spike in appointments, told the Sonoma Index Tribune that it is worried about making ends meet, amidst increased need and decreased grant funding.