Why are we purposefully putting our children at risk? Shouldn’t vaccines stay mandated? Florida just removed all vaccination requirements for diseases like chickenpox and hepatitis B, but is that really the best idea?
When vaccine requirements are removed, it is the children – our most vulnerable population – who face the greatest risks from preventable diseases. Florida’s decision to remove vaccine mandates threatens to undo the years of public health’s progress in leaving families and children vulnerable from diseases that can be controlled.
Vaccine mandates date back to 1809, when Massachusetts required the Smallpox Vaccine. Edward Jenner’s cowpox vaccine had been proven effective: after he “vaccinated nineteen children against smallpox and then allowed them to be exposed to the disease at a smallpox hospital… none of the children contracted smallpox.” This experiment showed that Jenner’s vaccine “protected people from smallpox without the risks of inoculation,” leading to the first “compulsory” vaccine law. The results were undeniable – between 1811 and 1837, only “thirty-nine deaths from smallpox were reported” (“Timeline of Vaccination Mandates” By René F. Najera).
But even then, mandated vaccination resistance existed. In 1838, people claimed the vaccine requirements “infringed on individual liberties,” and Massachusetts repealed the law. But the consequences were immediate, and by 1855, there were “1,032 reported smallpox deaths,” forcing the Legislature to reinstate vaccine mandates (Timeline of Vaccination Mandates By René F. Najera, DrPH).
Florida’s justification for ending mandates reflects the same individual liberties argument as the 1800s. Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo insists that removing the ban “will strengthen the sovereignty of patients,” claiming that the government “did not have the right to tell people what to put in their bodies” (“The Florida surgeon general who likens vaccine mandates to slavery” by Kayla Epstein).
The American Medical Association has strongly criticized Florida’s “rollback” of vaccine mandates, claiming it would “undermine decades of public health progress” and place children and communities at “increased risk” for diseases such as “measles, mumps, polio, and chickenpox resulting in serious illness, disability, and even death” (AMA statement on Florida ending all vaccine mandates by Sandra Adamson Fryhofer). The AMA, a professional organization for physicians, is giving professional medical advice, not just an ideological voice, proving that Florida’s reckless mandate removal can actively harm communities.
Florida’s policy change is a serious health risk. Without these standardized vaccine mandates that have been mandated for decades, and proved to be effective, preventable diseases can resurface and spread rapidly through schools and communities. In the end, vaccine mandate policy should prioritize public safety over ideology.
Florida Should Not Remove Vaccine Mandates
