A California man who has a son with leukemia is demanding the state ban children who are not immunized from his child’s school.
Carl Krawitt‘s 6-year old son Rhett has undergone a few rounds of chemotherapy and has not re-built his immunity yet sufficiently to get all of his immunizations. Until then, Krawitt has filed a request asking that the 7% of kids at his son’s school, Reed Elementary in Tiburon, California be forbidden from attending school. That rate is higher than the 2.5% statewide that take up the state’s option to skip immunization for personal and religious reasons. The San Francisco Bay area, generally, has some of the highest exemption rates in the state and nation.
Rhett requires “herd immunity” or others around him to all be immunized to protect him from coming down with communicable diseases like the measles.
“It’s very emotional for me,” Krawitt told NPR. “If you choose to not immunize your own child and your own child dies because they get measles, OK, that’s your responsibility, that’s your choice.”
He added, “but if your child gets sick and gets my child sick and my child dies, then…your action has harmed my child.”
Krawitt and his wife sent a letter asking the state “require immunization as a condition of attendance with the only exception being those who cannot medically be vaccinated.”
So far, the superintendent said he is considering and monitoring the situation and health of students at the school.
The only thing, by the time a kid contracts measles which has had a recent outbreak in California, it may be too late for Krawitt’s son.
What do you think? Fair or no?
h/t NPR