Following is a statement from the Wetzel-Tyler Health Department regarding West Virginia School Immunization Requirements:

The Wetzel Tyler Board of Health strongly supports West Virginia’s current school immunization requirements which permits only valid medical exemptions to forgo lifesaving immunizations.

These requirements have allowed West Virginia to keep immunization rates high, which have assisted in the prevention of serious childhood diseases such as polio, measles, mumps, rubella and pertussis. These diseases have devastating complications including deafness, blindness, paralysis, encephalitis, meningitis, sterilization, severe pneumonia and death.

Vaccines have been one of the most effective public health measures adopted that are responsible for drastically reducing, eliminating and often eradicating dangerous infectious diseases. Vaccines have significantly improved quality of life, saved lives and drastically decreased the burden on healthcare systems.

Many diseases listed above that were commonly diagnosed years ago are now rarely seen in the United States. These diseases were controlled and some eliminated due to the aggressive vaccination campaigns of our parents and grandparent’s generation. Unfortunately, this has given a false sense of security that these diseases now do not exist. That is not the case. These diseases do exist and are found in other countries or communities that have not had access to vaccines. In today’s world with increased travel and immigration, these diseases will slowly increase, spread and eventually make a full comeback if high vaccine rates are not maintained.

Measles, mumps, pertussis, and polio are spread by droplets in the air which make these highly contagious if you are not protected through vaccination. These diseases quickly and easily spread. Prompt diagnosis, isolation of the ill, and quarantine of contacts would help to slow the spread. In most recent disease mitigation, this has proved to be difficult and most refused to comply.

West Virginia school immunization requirements have enabled the state to obtain some of the highest kindergarten immunization rates in the nation. As a result, West Virginia has had no outbreak of vaccine preventable diseases. Medical exemptions to immunizations are permitted in West Virginia for children who have a contraindication to an immunization due to an underlying medical condition such as an allergy or an immune deficiency. Allowing non-medical exemptions to school immunization requirements will result in increasing the number of exemptions taken, reduce immunization rates, and provide an opportunity for vaccine preventable disease outbreaks to occur in our schools and our communities.

Due to West Virginia’s high immunization rates, the state has kept outbreaks of vaccine preventable diseases out of our schools and out of our communities. The only way to maintain this is to preserve the state policy regarding school immunization requirements as is without allowing person belief exemptions.