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ALBANY – After a measles epidemic in Brooklyn and Rockland County and the growing concern over the anti-vaccine movement, two state lawmakers are proposing to allow minors to be vaccinated without permission from their parents.
The bill would allow any child aged 14 or older to be vaccinated and receive booster shots for a range of illnesses, including mumps, diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, influenza, and the like. Hepatitis B and measles, which seemed to be the main reason for alarming recent outbreaks.
"We are on the brink of a public health crisis," said actress Patricia Fahy, Democrat of Albany, a member of the bill, citing lower vaccination rates than recommendations in some communities, motivated by unaccountable suspicions. confirmed on vaccines causing autism. "We have become complacent over the past two decades."
This feeling was recently amplified by the World Health Organization, which ranked "vaccine hesitancy" among the top 10 global threats. In Rockland County, authorities report 145 confirmed cases of measles, with the vast majority of people aged 18 and under. Of these, four in five have received no measles, mumps and rubella vaccines.
Municipal health officials also reported more than 100 cases of measles in Brooklyn and a single case in Queens. As in Rockland County, most of these cases involved members of Jewish Orthodox communities where vaccination rates were generally well below the norm.
If passed and passed, the bill would make New York a group of states – ranging from Oregon Liberal to South Carolina's conservatives – who allow minors to apply for vaccines without the permission of their parents, although some states also require minors to be assessed to determine whether they should be vaccinated. they are mature enough to make such a decision. The New York bill would not require such an assessment.
More and more states, including New York, are allowing minors to seek health services on issues such as addiction, mental health or reproductive health services.
The bill was introduced just days after the dramatic testimony before the Congress of an Ohio teenager, Ethan Lindenberger, who challenged his mother's wishes and got himself vaccinated after being convinced that she was prey to online conspiracy theories about the dangers of vaccines. Many studies have debunked these theories, including a major European report published last week, which showed that vaccination against measles, mumps and rubella did not increase the risk of autism.
On Monday, the New York chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics spoke out in favor of the bill, saying it was following a long-standing idea known as the A "mature minor" exception to parental consent as well as a more recent awareness that young people are better at recognizing false reports online.
"Young people are often more aware of misinformation on the Internet and can often disagree with parents who have bought unsubstantiated and dangerous anti-vaccination diatribes and pseudoscience," said a memo from the organization in favor of Bill. "These young people have the right to protect themselves."
Highly contagious, measles can contribute to many serious health complications, especially in children, including pneumonia and swelling of the brain. It can also be fatal in rare cases. The measles vaccine came into effect in the 1960s and the disease was declared eradicated in the United States in 2000.
Most states allow religious exemptions to vaccination requirements, but some states have rejected such exemptions, notably in California. banned them in 2015 after a measles epidemic and an erosion of vaccination rates. Democratic lawmakers in Albany have also introduced a bill to eliminate religious exemptions, although it is not clear that he is getting a vote.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, vaccination rates for measles, mumps and rubella still exceed 90%, although they are down from two decades ago. But, as Rockland County shows, some communities are virtually unvaccinated.
US Senator Liz Krueger, a Democrat from Manhattan who is sponsoring the bill in Albany's upper house, said the bill would target not only minors put at risk by their parents' prejudices against vaccines, but also adults without adults engaged in their lives.
"You talk about a fairly heavy level of maturity if you say," I want to be vaccinated although I can not make any adult in my family understand why it's important, "she said. declared.
Fahy said she was "very sensitive to the right of parents to monitor the health care of their children," but felt that public health problems in the broad sense were enormous.
"It's not just the person at risk when she's not immune," she said. "You put others in danger."
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