A new government study says some pockets of US kindergarten-age children are still unvaccinated against preventable diseases and this poses a public health threat.
Data of US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reveals only 1.7 percent of parents of small kids sought exemptions from laws last year requiring their children to be vaccinated.
Director of CDC’s National Center for immunization and Respiratory Diseases, Dr Anne Schuchat, said those kids who miss the vaccinations leave the communities vulnerable to vaccine-preventable diseases outbreaks.
Meanwhile, lawmakers are making efforts to strengthen the exemption rules of school vaccination. Including California, there are nine other states to welcome new rules.
Earlier this year there was a measles outbreak at Disneyland in Anaheim. More than 100 people were sickened due to this.
The measles vaccination rate is 94 percent in the US and hence the outbreak was less there compared to Canada, said Schuchat.