Anti-Vaccination Community Hit With The Worst Chickenpox Outbreak In 20 Years

A case of chicken pox has broken out in North Carolina at The Asheville-Waldorf School.

Wayne

• Published in News
• December 13, 2018

The cause was partly due to a high percentage of families claiming exemption from vaccines due to religious and other reasons. The private school complies with North Carolina state’s requirement for all students to receive certain immunisations, but also caters to exemptions on religious or medical grounds.

Due to this, the school now holds the record of the largest outbreak of chicken pox in the state since the vaccine was made available more than 20 years ago.

According to The Citizen-Time, a local major daily newspaper, 19 out of the 28 kindergarteners had an exemption.

New state record for chicken pox outbreak

The school facilitates children from nursery school up to sixth grade

High vaccine exemption rate

The Citizen-Times reports that Buncombe County places first in North Carolina in terms of religious exemptions with 5.7 percent.

Highly contagious

As of Friday 16th November, about 36 students at the school had contracted the virus, also known as varicella

Ongoing battle against anti-vaccination

The ongoing debate on vaccination continues to trudge on, with some still refusing to vaccinate their child. Many health experts still stress that it would be better to vaccinate than not.

"It's not just about you"

Susan Sullivan, a nurse at the North Carolina Department Health and Human Services reiterates the fact that "It's not just about you". Susan states, "It's about the people you interact with: Pregnant women, people with AIDS, people finishing chemo. They're a part of our community, too, and we have to do what we can to protect everybody,"

Imminent Danger

Sullivan also cautions us, "The thing people need to understand is that when you have pockets of unvaccinated people, they serve as reservoirs for disease"

Wayne