This was a response to much contact with his office and multiple conversations with his staff.-
Thank you for contacting my office regarding your opposition to SB 277 (Pan) relating to vaccinations. I appreciate you taking the time to write me on issues mattering most to you. The recent outbreak of measles has caused many to believe we are now seeing the effect of California’s “exemption” clause. This has now prompted debate of our state’s policy on the issue and has materialized into SB 277 which will mandate vaccines for public school children by eliminating the personal exemption clause. Having heard both sides of the vaccine debate in my role as a member of the Senate Education Committee, I do not believe the current outbreak of measles warrants elimination of the personal exemption. While I am sensitive to the needs of immune compromised individuals, the reality is some vaccines (such as the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella vaccine) wear off after time. Some vaccines actually make the person vaccinated contagious for a while (i.e. the Chicken Pox vaccine). We also have a large immigrant and tourist population who are not vaccinated. To that end, an elimination of the personal exemption is not in and of itself helpful to those who are immune compromised. A parent having a child with a compromised immune system would be negligent to place their child in a public school or public amusement park without expecting diseases to be transmitted. With all that said, I value vaccines and the medical advances that have created a plethora of vaccines available to protect us from many horrible diseases. I have even inoculated myself and my family. However, the current rules of inoculation, in my estimation, are not broken, and are serving us well. I have not yet heard a compelling argument that would warrant my trading the personal choice of parents to an over-reach of governmental authority. Bottom line is preserving the freedom of choice is outweighing the need for this measure. I think both sides of the argument can be protected by educating people to the realities of vaccines not mandating them. Rest assured, your thoughts on this issue was logged and taken into consideration. Once again, thank you for contacting me. If I may be of further assistance on this or any other state-related matter, please do not hesitate to contact me at either of my offices. It is an honor to represent you in the State Senate. Sincerely, Bob Huff |
#1 by K on May 13, 2015 - 9:31 pm
Senator Huff,
You are my hero! I’m a lifelong Democrat, but I would vote for you over any other candidate any day.
Since all of this started up, I have been forced to seek a medical exemption for my son, who started having seizures within 24 hours of being vaccinated with Dtap and two other vaccines. I finally have a partial medical exemption for him (his neurologist has exempted him from the three vaccines he received that day). I don’t see why I should be forced to give him the chicken pox (varicella) vaccine and hope that it doesn’t cause him any more neurological problems. In my son’s case, and especially with an illness like chicken pox, I consider the vaccine to be much more risky than the actual disease.
Another thing to note, which you may have already heard before, is that the CDC itself says that unvaccinated children are not the cause of outbreaks of pertussis, yet Dtap is on the list of mandatory vaccinations in this bill. Admittedly, pertussis is a dangerous disease for babies, and the public should be educated about its symptoms and the need to get antibiotics to stop transmission of the illness. But that is not the same thing as mandating it. And if I haven’t already shared with you a 2013 FDA study on baboons and the Dtap vaccine, I would like to note that the study showed that the bacteria which causes pertussis stays in the airways of the recently vaccinated for up to six weeks afterwards. This means that people who have been recently vaccinated with Dtap are a threat to the immuno-compromised and young babies.
Senator Huff, I am not against vaccines (my older child was fully vaccinated), but I think there has been a lack of transparency about the risks associated with vaccines. I hope you will consider sponsoring a law that would require doctors to report any serious medical events within 4 days of a vaccination to a database, and that would levy a hefty fine on them if they did not report within a reasonable time frame. The current system, VAERs, does not function. Doctors are supposed to report to it, but rarely do, and parents rarely know about it. Then people attack the validity of VAERs because there are some parents who find out about it and make their own report (like me), saying that the reports are not verified. So let’s make a law that only doctors can report, but require them to inform parents of the law at the time of vaccination, make the database accessible to the public so parents can check up on their doctor’s report, and fine the doctors if they refuse to do it!
Again, thank you so much for being brave enough to stand up against powerful lobbyists and your colleagues. I know it takes a tremendous amount of guts to speak honestly and openly about your views in the current climate. Know that there are many of us taking that same risk in our communities, and you have given us hope. Bless you!