Health officials remind parents to get children vaccinated ahead of school year

JACKSON, Tenn. — As children head back to school, health officials urge parents and guardians to remain vigilant against vaccine-preventable diseases.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, overall vaccination rates amongst kindergarteners remains at its lowest level in decades.

These lower rates include immunizations against many preventable but dangerous diseases such as measles, mumps, rubella, whooping cough, and polio.

As of July 11, cases of measles, a highly contagious disease that was eradicated in 2000 through vaccinations, were reported by 24 states.

“We’ve got about a historical rate of about 95 percent of kids going into kindergarten that have all those vaccines. That’s dropped down to about 93 percent which may not seem like a big change but that puts about three quarters of a million children at increased risk,” said Atul Grover, executive director of the AAMC Research and Action Institute.

It is important for children to be fully vaccinated, especially as clusters of under-vaccinated children have led to recent outbreaks and could spur ones in the future.

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