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PRESIDENT’S
MESSAGE
The saying “Freedom isn’t free” typi-
cally is used to promote military service,
but that isn’t the only kind of war it ap-
plies to, as the citizens of California have
discovered.
As this is written, parents in California
can use either a religious exemption or a
personal belief exemption to not have
their children receive the typical vaccina-
tions. A number of reasons for this exist
but most of the cases are attributed to
upper-middle-class, “all natural” parents
who believe that the vaccines are respon-
sible for causing allergies or autism, or
else are a profit-generating “snake oil”
foisted on the population by unscrupu-
lous pharmaceutical companies. Thanks
to that set of circumstances, an outbreak
of measles has plagued California and
now has spread to several other states.
The outbreak originated in 39 cases of
children who had visited Disneyland in
December, and now has spread to more
than 100 people in multiple states. It’s
pretty disturbing when you consider that
8 San Antonio Medicine • April 2015
LCesasonlisffroomrnia
By James L. Humphreys, MD
2015 BCMS President
measles was a disease largely eliminated legislation presently on this. One of the
in the United States, thanks to wide- draft resolutions to be reviewed and po-
spread vaccination programs. tentially submitted from the BCMS del-
egation to the TMA is in fact urging the
In response, two California state sena- TMA to lobby the legislature to make
tors, Dr. Richard Pan (Dem.), a pediatri- vaccines mandatory with only medical
cian, and Ben Allen (Dem.), have exemptions being valid. TMA has long
proposed legislation that will eliminate been a proponent of vaccination, of
the “personal belief ” exemption to vacci- course, with the ubiquitous and long-
nation. On top of that, the two Califor- running, “Be wise, immunize” campaign.
nia U.S. senators, Dianne Feinstein
(Dem.) and Barbara Boxer (Dem.), are Texans generally pride themselves as
urging the California legislation to also being different from Californians, and
remove the “religious belief ” exemption. many lifelong Texans that I have known
California Gov. Jerry Brown had pushed have written off Californians as a bunch
for more parental choice in application of of “godless hippies and weirdos.” That
vaccines to children as of two years ago, notwithstanding, I hope our state can
but he is now changing his tune and is learn something from California this
apparently open to reform of the state time and avoid a similar experience our-
vaccine laws. selves.
As you can imagine, this is a hot topic Much of the information for this edi-
of discussion in public health circles, and torial was derived from an excellent arti-
I will be interested to see if Texas vacci- cle summarizing the situation in
nation laws end up strengthened by the California by Lisa M. Krieger and Jessica
end of this legislative session in response Calefati that appeared in early February
to this outbreak. I expect some proposed on the site Mercurynews.com.