Colorado's lagging childhood vaccination rates an "accident waiting to happen"
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More Colorado parents are opting out of vaccinating their kids on religious or personal grounds, alarming local health officials.
Why it matters: The decreasing number of vaccinated children in Colorado could leave the state vulnerable to a resurgence of avoidable diseases like measles, which have made a comeback worldwide amid falling immunization rates.
What they're saying: "We're an accident waiting to happen," Susan Lontine, head of Immunize Colorado, a nonprofit whose mission is to shield Coloradans from vaccine-preventable diseases, said in an interview with CPR.
The big picture: 92.1% of Colorado's K-12 students received all six mandatory vaccines in the 2023-24 school year or had a valid exemption — largely unchanged from the 91.9% in the prior year, according to the latest data from the state's public health department.
- The state's goal is for every school to have at least 95% of the student population vaccinated to achieve herd immunity.
- Despite recent rules making it harder to get vaccine exemptions for personal beliefs, the rate of medical excuses increased by roughly 8% in the 2023-24 academic year over the previous one.
Zoom in: State data shows immunization rates among kindergarteners are the lowest, with only 90.1% vaccinated, and personal exemptions rising to 4.2%.
- Although kindergarteners' MMR coverage — which protects against measles, mumps and rubella — increased to 88.3% from the previous year's 86.8%, the rate still concerns state health officials.
- "Our rates among our kindergarten-age population in Colorado have been lower than what we'd like them to be historically," Heather Roth, immunization branch chief for the health department, told our reporting partners at Chalkbeat.
The intrigue: Lagging levels persist despite a state campaign using text messages, emails and postcards — focused on the MMR vaccine — to remind parents to get their children immunized.
What's next: The state's mobile health clinic, which offers childhood vaccinations to uninsured or underinsured families, is rolling across the state at various locations through late August.