A new bill introduced to the State House would remove personal exemptions for vaccinating children who attend public schools, including in the Lake Washington School District (LWSD).

House Bill 2009 (HB2009) would remove a clause that says allows for “a written certification signed by any parent or legal guardian of the child… that the signator has either a philosophical or personal objection to the immunization of the child,” leaving only medical and religious exemptions in place.

Introduced by Rep. June Robinson, a Democrat from Everett and member of the House Health Care and Wellness Committee, the bill came out in response to a reported outbreak of measles at Disneyland in January.

In 2011, the State Legislature passed a law that required parents to get a doctor’s signature in order to exempt their children from vaccination for medical reasons. All but two states allow for religious exemptions for vaccination of children attending public schools.

According to King County, Washington State has fewer than 10 cases of measles reported a year. In 2013, only four were reported in the county.

The State Department of Health reported that LWSD had a 6.13 percent exemption rate. Out of the 1,258 reported, they were overwhelming for personal reasons, at 87 percent. Approximately nine percent were for medical, while approximately four percent were for religious reasons.

The school with the highest exemption rate in LWSD was Emerson K-12 which, according to 2011 stats obtained the DOH, had nearly 40 percent of students exempted from vaccines, mainly for personal reasons. Out of the 218 enrolled, 30 percent were exempted for measles. According to LWSD Spokesperson Kathryn Reith, the school is a partnership between the district and home school families. Under the new law, however, students at the school may be affected, as the Office of Superintendent for Public Instruction has it categorized as a public school.

Reith said the district policy would only prohibit vaccinated students who have the proper documentation from attending class if the student contracts a particular disease.

The school with the lowest vaccine exemption rate in Kirkland was Holy Family Parish School, a private school, at two percent. Private schools are not required by law to provide religious or personal exemptions.

When it comes to the stance of local politicians, State Sen. Andy Hill says he supports the goal of having 90 percent of the state population vaccinated but declined to comment on the bill specifically, saying he hasn’t had a chance to read it. State Rep. Larry Springer said he supports the idea, but is waiting until it passes through committee before he decides how to cast his vote.

“You never know what the language is going to be when it gets out of committee,” he said.

Either way, he feels the personal exemption should be removed, though he believes parents have a right to exempt their children for religious and medical reasons.

“If there is a medical reason not to inoculate you shouldn’t vaccinate,” he said. “Parents have had very legitimate and defensible objections on religious and spiritual grounds. I respect that. But when you have someone who can say ‘I just have personal reasons’…if those personal reasons dictated a decision that only affected their child, that would be one thing. This is a public health issue and I just want to make sure we don’t see a continual rebound of diseases we thought we had gotten rid of long ago.”

Springer added that he is alarmed at the number of elementary school students who are not vaccinated.

“It’s astounding… I was shocked at the percentages of the student population around the state that are not vaccinated. That is just a public safety issue, a public health issue that we can’t ignore.”

State Rep. Roger Goodman said he also supports the bill due to what he believes is the solid scientific research behind vaccines. He also said that he considers places like Vashon Island, where 20 percent of school children are not vaccinated, at risk for an outbreak in measles.

“I don’t believe there is a basis for anyone to deny a vaccination for their children for personal reasons that are not supported by science,” he said. “There’s been some sensational claims that vaccines are linked to autism or other disorders but this has been completely debunked… we don’t let peanuts into schools but we let children who haven’t been vaccinated into schools. I’m not sure that makes a lot of sense. We’re paying more attention to peanut allergies.”

One of the potential problems with the bill, however, is that parents who previously opted for personal reasons can just switch over to religious exemption.

“I suppose if this bill were to pass and we looked three years from now and we have the same percentage not being vaccinated and the religious has replaced the personal one, we’ll have to look at that,” Springer said.