In the state of Washington, a lowered vaccination rate has led to an outbreak of measles in multiple counties, leading to 72 confirmed cases since April, according to the Washington State Department of Health. In New York City, a low vaccination rate among the Orthodox Jewish community has led to an outbreak that has resulted in 466 cases throughout the city since September, according to the New York City Department of Health.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there have been 764 measles cases in the country in 2019 as of May 3, a sharp rise compared to 372 cases last year and just 63 in 2010.
Yavapai County health officials say there is not currently any measles outbreak, nor any reason to worry about one in the immediate future. However, vaccination rates for measles, mumps and rubella remain somewhat lower than health professionals advise, and the Verde Valley faces potential risk of an outbreak.
“In the Verde Valley, the percentage of kindergarten students immunized against measles is less than 80%. For Community Immunity, 90-95% of the population needs to be immunized,” Catherine Sutton, public health nurse supervisor for Yavapai County Community Health Services, wrote in an email. “Overall in Yavapai County, the kindergarten immunization rates for all vaccines are 83-89%, which are the lowest in the state. The personal exemption rate for kindergarteners is 12.5%, which is the highest in the state. 76-93% of 6th graders in Yavapai County have received all state required vaccines, again the lowest in the state. The sixth grade exemption rate is 16.4%, which is also the highest in the state.”
Community Immunity, often referred to as herd immunity, refers to a situation where a high enough percentage of a given population is vaccinated that even if one unvaccinated individual catches the disease, it is virtually impossible for it to spread to others in the community. This is considered necessary for the small portion of the population who, due to allergies or immune system problems, are unable to take the vaccine and prevents them from being able to catch it from their neighbors.
“While the risk of a case appearing in Yavapai is very low, it’s not impossible,” Stephen Everett, an epidemiologist working for Yavapai County, wrote in an email. “Several months ago, we had a tourist that passed through Sedona and was later diagnosed with measles. When that occurred, I had to track down all the places she went and try to determine not only who was there with them at the time but also all the people that had been in the same areas for the four hours after. Measles is an airborne virus that can linger in the air for hours. Fortunately for us, no cases developed.”
According to Arizona state law, parents are not legally required to vaccinate their children, but must provide an Immunization Exemption to the school nurse in order to enroll their child at public school if they choose not to have them vaccinated. School nurses at Verde Valley schools claim generally high immunization rates. Cottonwood-Oak Creek School District nurse Bob Clark said that the district is at 95% immunization for the Measles, Mumps and Rubella, or MMR, vaccine and 97% for chicken pox.
Camp Verde Unified School District Admini-strator-In-Charge Danny Howe put the district’s immunization rate at around 95%. But the Sedona-Oak Creek School District has shown higher rates of non-immunization, with 15% of students exempted from MMR and 25% exempt from other vaccines.
“I think there is some sort of vaccine hesitancy movement,” Sutton wrote. “I am working with schools in the county to provide immunization clinics on site for convenience. Yavapai County Education Service also has a nurse that works with the schools to provide immunizations on site.”
YCCHS offers vaccinations at locations in Prescott, Prescott Valley and Cottonwood at rates of $20 for people without insurance.
According to Sutton, the YCHHS staff has administered 78 more MMR vaccines in 2019 than at the same point in 2018.
“My staff and I work diligently to call folks who are due for vaccines to come in and receive them,” Sutton wrote. “When people are vaccine hesitant, our goal is to provide education to them. We try to explain that experiencing the symptoms of any of the vaccine preventable diseases is far worse than the most of the side effects from the vaccines.”
Repeated scientific studies have found no link between vaccines and autism, despite now-discredited claims alleging a connection.
The 1998 study by Andrew Wakefield that sparked the modern anti-vaccine movement was based on a sample size of 12 children and didn’t examine medical histories of those 12 kids. The Lancet, the British medical journal that originally published Wakefield’s study retracted the article, stating that Wakefield’s findings “are incorrect, contrary to the findings of an earlier investigation.”
The General Medical Council in the U.K. rescinded Wakefield’s medical license in 2010.
In April, a collection of scientists at the University of Copenhagen completed a 20-year study of every child born in Denmark between 1999 and 2010, a total of 657,461 cases, and found no signs of higher risk of autism among those children who received the MMR vaccine compared to the general population, taking into account genetic factors such as family history that lead to higher autism risk.
Jon Hecht can be reached at 634-8551 or email jhecht@larsonnewspapers.com
