CDC: CO kindergartners have lowest measles vaccination rate

[Deleted]

I still have a few years before my kiddo goes to K but this doesn't give me confidence.  


CDC: Kindergartners in Colorado have lowest measles vaccination rate in the nation

kdvr.com/2015/02/04/cdc-kindergartners-in-colorado-have-lowest-measles-vaccination-rate-in-the-nation/

DENVER — Some health experts say Colorado is vulnerable to a major outbreak of measles after a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report revealed Colorado kindergartners have the lowest vaccination rates in the country.



Some doctors have taken a hard stance in regards to parents who do not vaccinate their children.



Colorado is one of 20 states that give parents control over vaccinations even though they are highly recommended.



On the Douglas County School District website, it says parents who have religious or personal objects, or students who have a medical reason for exemption, can sign a form to opt out of the vaccinations.



But some pediatricians are refusing to see children who haven’t had their shots. Doctors say it’s not just about protecting children.



“We were concerned that there would be a case of measles in our county and we didn’t want our practice to be where that case showed up,” Dr. Nelson Branco said. “We didn’t want to spread measles in waiting room.”



Doctors recommend children receive one dose of the measles vaccine at 12 to 15 months and a second dose between the ages of 4 and 6 years old.



In Colorado, there has been one confirmed case of the measles outbreak linked to Disneyland.

[IIOY]

Read this for possible (partial) explanation. :-)

pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=gotopost&board=15&thread=416110&post=8574372

[meshaliuknits]

WE'RE NOT NUMBER ONE! NOT NUMBER ONE!

[MrsAxilla]

Feb 4, 2015 13:22:02 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Read this for possible (partial) explanation. :-)

pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=gotopost&board=15&thread=416110&post=8574372

Thanks for this! I read the OP last night an was horrified, but I didn't see any explanation for the low rates.

[laurenpetro]

Feb 4, 2015 13:22:02 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Read this for possible (partial) explanation. :-)

pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=gotopost&board=15&thread=416110&post=8574372

but wouldn't that be an across-the-board thing then? 

[IIOY]

Feb 4, 2015 13:28:15 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

Feb 4, 2015 13:22:02 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Read this for possible (partial) explanation. :-)

pandce.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=gotopost&board=15&thread=416110&post=8574372

but wouldn't that be an across-the-board thing then? 

It depends. What is the birthday cut off in the various school districts in Colorado? More to the point, a low vax rate for K doesn't necessarily mean a low vax rate overall. CO may be lower but ultimately not low, if that makes sense.

[MrsAxilla]

Feb 4, 2015 13:33:00 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Feb 4, 2015 13:28:15 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

but wouldn't that be an across-the-board thing then? 

It depends. What is the birthday cut off in the various school districts in Colorado? More to the point, a low vax rate for K doesn't necessarily mean a low vax rate overall. CO may be lower but ultimately not low, if that makes sense.

The cut off in my district is Oct 1, and school starts in August. Ben turned five a few weeks before school started, but there were definitely a few late birthdays in his class (and, as I later found out, at least one true anti-vaxxer).

[mrsGreeko]

Also because in CO you can just sign a personal exemption from the vaccines some parents do that rather than trying to scrounge up their kids' records. When you are at registration and you realized you forgot the vaccine records at home it can be easier just to sign the paper.


There are certain counties that are particularly bad about actually vaccinating though.

[sparrowsong]

This doesn't surprise me. We've got the fundie crazies in The Springs, the crunchy crazies in Boulder, the privledged upper class special snowflake parents in highland ranch... It's a perfect storm of anti-vaxxers.

[shanbrite2]

I believe it. The high school DH teaches at had a huge outbreak of whooping cough and moms on the local FB board are always asking for pedis who are "friendly" to anti vaxxers. I feel like I need to start screening play dates. Our laws are way too lenient and we have way too many people who think Dr Google knows more than an actual doctor. Ingredients!!!

[ijack]

Feb 4, 2015 13:33:00 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Feb 4, 2015 13:28:15 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

but wouldn't that be an across-the-board thing then? 

It depends. What is the birthday cut off in the various school districts in Colorado? More to the point, a low vax rate for K doesn't necessarily mean a low vax rate overall. CO may be lower but ultimately not low, if that makes sense.

I don't think this is the case. If I remember correctly kids have to have the last round of shots before they enter school and you can choose to do them at the 4 or 5y well visit. Obviously this is if you aren't opting out.
CO has crazy low rates of vaccination unfortunately

[ESF]

This doesn't surprise me. It's my understanding that Colorado has a lot of far-right religious people and far-left granola people.

[IIOY]

Feb 4, 2015 14:45:16 GMT -5 ijack said:

Feb 4, 2015 13:33:00 GMT -5 IIOY said:

It depends. What is the birthday cut off in the various school districts in Colorado? More to the point, a low vax rate for K doesn't necessarily mean a low vax rate overall. CO may be lower but ultimately not low, if that makes sense.

I don't think this is the case. If I remember correctly kids have to have the last round of shots before they enter school and you can choose to do them at the 4 or 5y well visit. Obviously this is if you aren't opting out.
CO has crazy low rates of vaccination unfortunately

This could very well be the case, of course.  Any idea why CO has low rates?  Who is driving the anti-vax agenda there?

[ESF]

Feb 4, 2015 15:06:35 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Feb 4, 2015 14:45:16 GMT -5 ijack said:

I don't think this is the case. If I remember correctly kids have to have the last round of shots before they enter school and you can choose to do them at the 4 or 5y well visit. Obviously this is if you aren't opting out.
CO has crazy low rates of vaccination unfortunately

This could very well be the case, of course.  Any idea why CO has low rates?  Who is driving the anti-vax agenda there?

People in Colorado Springs and Boulder.

I had a friend that lived in Boulder once.  She told me that she didn't like taking Tylenol or Advil for headaches, because you know, the chemicals.  She regularly dropped acid though.  I have no idea if she has vaccinated her three children, but I'm guessing not. She home schools.  Fortunately for the people of Boulder, she lives in Massachusetts now.

[ijack]

Feb 4, 2015 15:06:35 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Feb 4, 2015 14:45:16 GMT -5 ijack said:

I don't think this is the case. If I remember correctly kids have to have the last round of shots before they enter school and you can choose to do them at the 4 or 5y well visit. Obviously this is if you aren't opting out.
CO has crazy low rates of vaccination unfortunately

This could very well be the case, of course.  Any idea why CO has low rates?  Who is driving the anti-vax agenda there?

The hippies and the religious zealots. There is LOTS of alternative med here.

[sparrowsong]

Maybe related to why we have the lowest obesity rates, highest fitness rates, highest gluten free diets.... Lots of people here are obsessed with health and keeping their bodies, and their children, pure healthy temples. Chemicals are bad. Vaccines are chemicals. Or something.

[IIOY]

Feb 4, 2015 15:13:34 GMT -5 ESF said:

Feb 4, 2015 15:06:35 GMT -5 IIOY said:

This could very well be the case, of course.  Any idea why CO has low rates?  Who is driving the anti-vax agenda there?

People in Colorado Springs and Boulder.

I had a friend that lived in Boulder once.  She told me that she didn't like taking Tylenol or Advil for headaches, because you know, the chemicals.  She regularly dropped acid though.  I have no idea if she has vaccinated her three children, but I'm guessing not. She home schools.  Fortunately for the people of Boulder, she lives in Massachusetts now.

Seems legit!

I'm intrigued that CO has become a haven for the crazies.  Maybe that was the case when I lived there and I was just too young to realize it, but I never associated CO with the loony folks.  This is like finding out part of my childhood was a complete lie.  No, this IS finding out that part of my childhood was a complete lie.  I'll be over in the corner with a therapist and some Golden Oreos, thx.

[chedifuen]

I'm shocked its not Oregon

[downtoearth]

This is the same report that IIOY and I were talking about that is linked in the OP and the post she noted.

 And it's interesting to note that CO is the only state where the reporting to the CDC was by "random sampling" survey and not by other means.  I wonder if the sampling was as random as it should be and who did the reporting.  I know that we had to sign a disclosure with our pediatrician to include our stats into the state vaccine database; however, the CDC reports that the CO survey was for 350 kids out of 69,904 enrolled kids in K.  That is super low for reporting at only 0.5% of the total enrolled surveyed?!  Does that seem reasonable, it's the lowest # of survey members in the data for any state? I am not a statistician, but we could not get away with that as "random sampling" in my line of work.  Do they not have a better way to report?  (www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6341a1.htm)

The same report says that CO has around 3200 exemptions (religious and philosophical).  CO also doesn't offer a medical exemption at all (or at least they didn't 3ish years ago) - there was no form where you can sign for medical exemption, so all medical also are registered as "philosophical exemptions."  That turns out to be 4.6%, which is tied for 8th highest rate (AK, AZ, ID, IL, ME, MI, OR, VT, WA, and WI all have higher).  It was 4.3% the year before.

I guess this makes for good news and maybe will help prompt people to get vaccines, but I also think that somebody in the CO State Health Dept. should speak to how they report to the CDC. There has got to be a better way.

[ijack]

Yeah, if you look at our reporting numbers compared to other states it's kind of ridiculous
www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6230a3.htm#Tab1

[IIOY]

Feb 4, 2015 16:04:10 GMT -5 ijack said:

Yeah, if you look at our reporting numbers compared to other states it's kind of ridiculous
www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6230a3.htm#Tab1

That is ridiculous.  Doesn't this beg the question whether the reported percentage can even be trusted?

[downtoearth]

Feb 4, 2015 16:06:37 GMT -5 IIOY said:

Feb 4, 2015 16:04:10 GMT -5 ijack said:

Yeah, if you look at our reporting numbers compared to other states it's kind of ridiculous
www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6230a3.htm#Tab1

That is ridiculous.  Doesn't this beg the question whether the reported percentage can even be trusted?

Shhh... this will be the next blog comments by those-anti-vaxers-who-cannot-be-named.

[MrsAxilla]

Feb 4, 2015 13:48:17 GMT -5 mrsGreeko said:

Also because in CO you can just sign a personal exemption from the vaccines some parents do that rather than trying to scrounge up their kids' records. When you are at registration and you realized you forgot the vaccine records at home it can be easier just to sign the paper.


There are certain counties that are particularly bad about actually vaccinating though.

I'm pretty sure I read last night that the personal exemption was just enacted in 2012 or 13.

[mrsGreeko]

Feb 4, 2015 17:01:22 GMT -5 MrsAxilla said:

Feb 4, 2015 13:48:17 GMT -5 mrsGreeko said:

Also because in CO you can just sign a personal exemption from the vaccines some parents do that rather than trying to scrounge up their kids' records. When you are at registration and you realized you forgot the vaccine records at home it can be easier just to sign the paper.


There are certain counties that are particularly bad about actually vaccinating though.

I'm pretty sure I read last night that the personal exemption was just enacted in 2012 or 13.

It was definitively around well before that because they were trying to change it in 2011 to make it more difficult and you can find calls to action among the anti-vaxxers. nvicadvocacy.org/members/Resources/VaccineExemptionsUnderAttackinColorado.aspx

For the record my kids are fully vaxed and I show their records
To the school.

[mrsGreeko]

We've held this dubious distinction for awhile: www.denverpost.com/ci_19429560

This is where I remember reading about people signing the personal exemption because it is easier.