The Public Health Demand for Revoking Non-Medical Exemptions to Compulsory Vaccination Statutes.

Abstract

In 2019, the United States saw the single largest outbreak of measles in recent history. The measles crisis has prompted state legislative bodies to face a seemingly impossible dilemma: eliminate both religious and philosophical exemptions to mandatory school vaccination statutes or sit by idly and allow measles to continue to run its course. As of June 2019, five states have neither religious nor philosophical exemptions to their mandatory vaccination statutes. This Note argues that states should remove all religious and philosophical exemptions to compulsory vaccination statutes. The 2019 measles outbreak demonstrates that the anti-vaccination movement poses a legitimate risk to the health of the masses, especially to the most vulnerable members of our communities. If individuals continue to opt out of compulsory vaccination requirements, diseases that were eradicated decades ago will undoubtably return to the absolute detriment of those unable to protect themselves.