With parents and students preparing for school to start again as measles cases continue to climb in parts of Pennsylvania, kindergarten-level immunization data from last school year shows dozens of elementary schools in the state\u2019s northeast region reported measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccination rates under 95%.<\/p>\n
That key immunization threshold is important as measles can \u201ceasily cross borders and cause outbreaks in any community where vaccination coverage rates are below 95%,\u201d per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC recently released data showing vaccination coverage among kindergarteners in the United States dropping<\/a> during the 2025-26 school year for measles and all other reported vaccines from the year prior, with American Academy of Pediatrics President Dr. Andrew Racine noting in a statement that \u201ceven a small decrease in vaccination rates can lead to more outbreaks of disease because community immunity requires over 95% of susceptible individuals to be immunized.\u201d<\/p>\n The national data and local school vaccination statistics published by the state Department of Health come amid the worst year for measles in the U.S. since 1991<\/a> \u2014 2025 was the second worst \u2014 with Pennsylvania contributing to the nationwide surge. While there\u2019s still yet to be a confirmed measles case in Northeast Pennsylvania this year, the number of confirmed cases statewide hit 379 as of Friday after Pennsylvania recorded just 16 cases of the highly contagious viral respiratory disease last year.<\/p>\n State school-level data<\/a> also shows MMR vaccination rates among kindergarteners having dropped at many Northeast Pennsylvania elementary schools compared to the 2018-19 school year, declines that coincide with rising levels of vaccine hesitancy nationwide.<\/p>\n The region<\/p>\n While rates at individual schools varied, county-level school vaccination summaries for both public and private schools show Lackawanna, Luzerne and Schuylkill counties all exceeded the 95% MMR vaccination threshold for kindergarteners during the 2025-26 school year.<\/p>\n Other more-rural counties in the region fell short, per the state Department of Health summaries.<\/p>\n DOH reports that 96.4% of 2,086 students enrolled in kindergarten in Lackawanna County had received at least two doses of the MMR vaccine. That was the case for 95.8% of 3,576 enrolled kindergarteners in Luzerne County and 95.8% of 1,370 enrolled kindergarteners in Schuylkill County.<\/p>\n Rates in other local counties were lower, particularly Wayne, where just 84.9% of enrolled kindergarteners had at least two MMR doses last school year. Pike County\u2019s kindergarten rates were slightly higher at 86.4%, followed by Monroe, 90.2%, Susquehanna, 92.8%, and Wyoming, 94.2%.<\/p>\n Gary Decker, M.D., director of infection control services for Commonwealth Health\u2019s hospitals in Lackawanna and Luzerne counties, said the MMR vaccine remains the best way to protect against measles and the 95% threshold for community immunity applies regardless of population size.<\/p>\n \u201cWhichever population you\u2019re measuring \u2014 whether it\u2019s the country, a state, a county or an individual school district or an individual school within the district \u2014 it holds true that to provide herd immunity to the entire population you\u2019re measuring \u2026 you have to achieve 95% immune success,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Individual schools<\/p>\n A number of local elementary schools fell short of that target for measles, even in the counties where the overall kindergarten vaccination rate exceeded it.<\/p>\n In Lackawanna County, for example, eight such schools were below the 95% MMR benchmark for kindergarteners last school year: Clarks Summit Elementary, 94%; Jefferson Elementary, 85.1%; Moscow Elementary, 91.9%; Newton Ransom Elementary, 91.7%; Old Forge Elementary, 94%; Our Lady of Peace School, 89.4%; Robert Morris Elementary, 94.1%; and South Abington Elementary, 93.9%.<\/p>\n All but two of those schools, Our Lady of Peace School and South Abington Elementary, were above 95% during the 2018-19 school year.<\/p>\n Jefferson Elementary accounted for the most precipitous drop between those two points, with its MMR vaccination rate falling from 98.2% to 85.1%. Only one of the aforementioned eight schools, South Abington Elementary, reported a higher rate last school year than during the 2018-19 school year, and that increase was nominal at just 0.1%.<\/p>\n In Luzerne County, state data shows seven schools below the 95% MMR benchmark for kindergarteners: Bear Creek Community Charter School, 94.7%; Cheder Menachem Inc., 61.3%; Cheder Menachem Schuyler Avenue, 75%; Freeland Elementary\/Middle School, 90.6%; Good Shepherd Academy, 92.6%; Lyndwood Elementary School, 93.3%; and Rice Elementary School, 93.1%.<\/p>\n Data from the 2018-19 school year was available for four of those schools \u2014 Bear Creek Community, Freeland, Good Shepherd and Rice \u2014 all of which reported MMR rates above 95% at that time. For the purposes of this analysis, the newspaper compared Lyndwood\u2019s rates last school year to those of Hanover Green Elementary School where Hanover Area School District students attended kindergarten during 2018-19 academic year, when the MMR rate there was 97.5%.<\/p>\n Cheder Menachem, a private Jewish school with locations in Wilkes-Barre and Kingston, reported relatively large percentages of students with religious exemptions to vaccine requirements at both sites last school year. Pennsylvania law<\/a> allows students to forgo otherwise mandatory vaccines for medical or religious reasons or based on a strong moral or ethical conviction.<\/p>\n There were four schools in Schuylkill County with fewer than 95% of enrolled kindergarteners vaccination against measles for 2025-26: Blue Mountain Elementary East, 89%; Blue Mountain Elementary West, 87.3%; the Early Childhood Education Center in the Minersville Area School District, 88.2%; and Saint Clair Area Elementary\/Middle School, 94.3%. All four reported MMR vaccination rates above 95% during the 2018-19 school year.<\/p>\n The state database for 2025-26 shows at least 22 other elementary schools across Monroe, Pike, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming counties with kindergarten MMR vaccination rates below 95%, though it isn\u2019t exhaustive. Among other caveats, the database doesn\u2019t list data for schools with kindergarten enrollment under 20 students, which is the case for many smaller private schools, and wouldn\u2019t include schools that didn\u2019t submit an immunization report to the state health department for the 2025-26 school year.<\/p>\n To search the database, visit www.pa.gov\/agencies\/health<\/a>.<\/p>\n Vaccine hesitancy<\/p>\n The yearslong trend of declining kindergarten vaccination rates isn\u2019t unique to the region or state, and measles has become less uncommon in recent years amid those declines.<\/p>\n