NEW YORK — U.S. kindergarten immunization rates fell last year, while the percentage of children receiving exemptions rose to a record high, according to federal data released Wednesday.
The percentage of children exempted from vaccination requirements rose to 3.3% from 3% the previous year. Meanwhile, 92.7% of kindergartners have received the required immunizations, a slight decline compared to the past two years. The vaccination rate before the COVID-19 pandemic was 95%, a rate at which a single infection was unlikely to cause a mass infection or outbreak.
The change may seem small, but it is significant and means about 80,000 children remain unvaccinated, health officials said.
Dr. Raynard Washington, chairman of the Metropolitan Health Coalition, which represents 35 metropolitan public health departments, said this infection rate goes far beyond explaining the alarming rise in pertussis, measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases. said it was helpful.
“All of us are facing an emerging infectious disease outbreak across the country,” said Washington, director of the Charlotte, North Carolina Health Department.
Washington noted that MMR, DTaP, polio and varicella vaccination rates among kindergarteners decreased in more than 30 states for the 2023-2024 school year, according to data from the Washington Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Public health officials are focusing on vaccination rates among kindergarteners because schools can be hotbeds of germs and sources of community transmission.
That rate has been high for years, thanks to mandatory school attendance that requires important vaccinations. All states and territories in the United States require children attending day care and school to be vaccinated against many diseases, including measles, mumps, polio, tetanus, whooping cough, and chickenpox.
All states allow exemptions for children with medical conditions that prevent them from receiving certain vaccines. And in most cases, exemptions for religious or other non-medical reasons are also allowed.
Over the past 10 years, the percentage of kindergarteners receiving medical exemptions has remained stable at about 0.2%. However, the proportion of non-medical exemptions has increased gradually, with the overall exemption rate more than doubling last year from 1.6% in the 2011-2012 school year.
This rate can be influenced by state laws and policies that make it harder or easier to obtain exemptions, as well as local attitudes among families and doctors about the need for childhood immunizations. For example, 14.3% of kindergartners in Idaho were exempt from one or more vaccines, according to CDC data. But in Connecticut and Mississippi, the rate was less than 1%.
Noel Brewer, a health behavior professor at the University of North Carolina, said clusters of unvaccinated children in the state could become more concentrated in certain communities or schools.
“People who are skeptical[of vaccine recipients]tend to live close to each other, creating an environment where measles and other diseases can spread,” he said.
The decline in vaccination rates was not unexpected. Experts say online misinformation and political divisions over COVID-19 vaccines are causing more parents to question routine childhood vaccinations they used to automatically accept. .
Louisville, Kentucky, which has been hailed as a vaccination success story, is already reporting a decline. And last week’s CDC report pointed to a decline in vaccination rates among 2-year-olds.
Measles and pertussis cases are at their highest levels since 2019, with three months left in the year. And in the 2023-2024 season, the number of influenza-related childhood deaths will reach 200, the highest number since 2009.
This year, Mecklenburg County, Charlotte, experienced the first case of measles in North Carolina since 2018. Mecklenburg County also had 19 whooping cough cases and three mumps cases earlier this year, Washington said, noting that the county doesn’t usually have cases.
The increase in international travel and people moving to the Charlotte area from other countries is increasing the risk of introducing vaccine-preventable diseases, “so we’re concerned that we could start to lose vaccine coverage among our population.” Washington said.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Education Media Group. AP is solely responsible for all content.
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