TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Florida could soon become the first state to eliminate vaccine mandates, including those required for school.<\/p>\n
What You Need To Know<\/p>\n
The Florida Department of Health held its first public workshop focused on repealing all vaccine mandates in the state<\/p>\n
Gov. Ron DeSantis and Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo are pushing to end all vaccine mandates in state law, though legislative approval is required<\/p>\n
Health experts warn the movement could deepen vaccine distrust, as Florida\u2019s kindergarten vaccination rate (88%) already trails the national average (93%)<\/p>\n
Marking the state’s first action toward a mandate repeal, the Florida Department of Health held its first public vaccine workshop Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is about freedom,\u201d said Larry Downs Jr., a Florida resident. \u201cThe default setting should be freedom, not these corporate chemical vaccine injections.\u201d<\/p>\n
Representatives from the Department of Health heard roughly three hours of public comment at the Panama City Beach meeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel very sad to hear the distrust of physicians in the medical community,\u201d said Dr. Frederick Southwick,\u00a0an infectious disease specialist at the University of Florida. \u201cWe only have our patients\u2019 welfare in mind.”<\/p>\n
The effort comes at the call of state leaders \u2014 especially DeSantis and Ladapo.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Florida Department of Health, in partnership with the governor, is going to be working to end all vaccine mandates in Florida law,\u201d said Ladapo in September. \u201cAll of them. All of them. Every last one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, to ban all mandates, Florida lawmakers must pass legislation through the state Senate and House.<\/p>\n
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, kindergarten vaccination rates are on the decline in Florida, hovering at around 88% \u2014 compared to the national average of 93%.<\/p>\n
Some in the medical community are growing increasingly concerned about the increasing anti-vaccine sentiment.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow it\u2019s ending vaccine mandates,\u201d said Dr. Rana Alissa, of the American Academy of Pediatric\u2019s Florida chapter. \u201cTomorrow insurance won\u2019t pay for the vaccines. The day after tomorrow clinics cannot have the vaccines. So this is this is just the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n
Under the current framework, there are essentially two main ways to get a vaccine exemption in Florida \u2014 people can either get a religious exemption, or a letter from a doctor saying the vaccine isn\u2019t in the patient\u2019s best medical interest.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2014\u00a0Florida could soon become the first state to eliminate vaccine mandates, including those required for school.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[3948,3140,274,6074,28,30,29,571,6075,2203,115,139,99,135,278],"class_list":["post-81497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-app-health","tag-app-local-state-politics","tag-app-top-stories","tag-capital-connection","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-health","tag-health-and-medicine","tag-jason-delgado","tag-news","tag-orlando","tag-politics","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}