One announcement this month from the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cast Washington in an unfavorable light. It’s up to the state’s parents to correct the problem. Ours is one of four states that have vaccine exemption rates above 5 percent for kindergartners entering school. The other three are Alaska, Oregon and Vermont. Washington’s rate is 6.2 percent. The rate in Clark County — home to more than 5,000 kindergartners — is 8.8 percent.
Why aren’t more children vaccinated? And haven’t most of these diseases been virtually eliminated? Technically, and legally, there are three answers to the first question. Parents can obtain immunization exemptions for medical, philosophical or religious reasons.
The answer to the second question was provided by Clark County Health Officer Dr. Alan Melnick in a recent online comment beneath a Columbian story about the CDC’s new figures. According to Melnick, “Now that these diseases are relatively uncommon, some parents may question the need to vaccinate their kids. But (the diseases) are uncommon precisely because of vaccination efforts.” In other words, the parents’ responsibility to become part of the solution is more than just to the child; it’s also to society.
Melnick wrote an additional answer to that second question: “Today we are seeing a disturbing re-emergence of vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles and whooping cough in communities with high rates of unvaccinated people.”