Problems few with vaccination rules
Area school officials say changes to vaccination requirements for the upcoming school year have resulted in relatively few problems.
Pennsylvania students could be excluded from school if they do not have the proper immunizations within five days of when the school year starts.
Under the new state Department of Health guidelines, students must have all the vaccine doses or a medical plan from their doctor for when they will receive those shots. Parents used to have eight months to get their kids current on their shots, but now will only have five days. Exemptions for medical reasons, religious beliefs or philosophical objections still will apply.
Trinity West Elementary School nurse Melissa Emery-Gillo said the district started notifying parents last spring of the changes for this school year. Nurses also came in an extra day over the summer to call district parents whose children still needed vaccinations, she said.
“Parents have been totally fine with it,” she said of the policy change.
Peters Township School District spokeswoman Shelly Belcher also said the district has been working on the issue for a while. During the last school year, nurses compiled a list of students who needed updated vaccinations.
“We communicated the general change in the policy from the Department of Health to our parents and sent letters home with specifics for the parents who were directly impacted for this upcoming school year,” Belcher said. “We also proactively shared the information with kindergarten parents at our early registrations in March.”
Throughout the summer, Peters used email and its automated-calling system to remind parents. Nurses also came in over the summer to update lists. The district still had more than 100 students on the list as of this month.
“Activity has certainly picked up now that school is just around the corner,” Belcher said.
Central Greene School District Superintendent Brian Uplinger also said the district started notifying parents during last school year. The district periodically sent out reminders through its email/text voicemail system, he said.
He said he has not received any calls from parents about the changes in vaccination requirements and hopes that the transition to the new year goes smoothly.
Dr. Lauren Robinson, state Department of Health deputy secretary for health promotion and disease prevention, said the changes have been several years in the making. She said that a 95 percent immunization rate is necessary for herd immunity, which prevents outbreaks of diseases.
In 2014, Pennsylvania’s rate was significantly below 95 percent, which led to conversations with the Centers for Disease Control, which tracks that information. The CDC said Pennsylvania had one of the longest provisional periods by allowing students to have eight months into the school year to be updated on shots. That created a concern that they were putting others at risk during the school year, she said.
Pennsylvania had to report its immunization rate to the CDC before the eighth-month provisional period was over, which may have been part of the reason the state’s immunization rate was lower, she said.
She said department officials worked with the Department of Education and school nurses, among others, to come up with the new policy. She said it is up to the discretion of school administrators as to whether a child should be excluded from school. She said the department recommends working with a family to create a medical plan if a student does not have the necessary vaccinations at the start of school.