Here’s What Some of California’s Least-Vaccinated Schools Have to Say for Themselves
There are schools in California where the vaccination rate is less than 20%. 20%! Chew on that for a bit, and I hope it leaves a bad taste in your mouth.
Lisa McCarthy certainly didn’t set out to run one of the least-vaccinated schools in California.
“If we attract people who choose not to immunize, it’s not because we recruit them,” says McCarthy, dean of education at Maple Village Waldorf, a private elementary school in Long Beach.
Only 3 of Maple Village’s 20 kindergartners, according to current data from the California Department of Public Health, are up to date on their measles, mumps, rubella shot—of which two doses are required. Just 21 kindergarten classes in the state have a lower vaccination rate for MMR. And those numbers are actually an improvement over 2013-14, when Maple Village’s kindergartners had the state’s fourth-lowest rate.