Evolution of School Vaccination Policies
In 1809 in Massachusetts, the first school vaccination requirement was enacted to prevent smallpox. By the early 1900s, almost half of the states had vaccination requirements for children entering school. In 1922, the Supreme Court ruled that vaccination ordinances for schools confer "the broad discretion required for the protection of public health."
Vaccination Policies Become Stricter and More Common
- By 1980-81, all states had mandatory vaccination laws for children entering school.
- By 1999, nearly all states had laws covering grades kindergarten through 12th grade, and thirty states had requirements for college.
"It's important to remember that in the 1950s, protecting the public from polio was, in the truest sense, a national project. Every effort was made to see that the vaccine would be widely available to all children and polio would be wiped out."
-CDC article |
To test the polio vaccine in 1952, schools volunteered their students to participate in clinical trials. Half of 1.8 million children received the vaccine and half received a placebo. The vaccine was proven successful.
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"Polio was so feared that schools gladly volunteered to participate in the trials, even though only half of the students would end up being protected by receiving a real vaccine (rather than a placebo)."-Paul Schreckenberger, Professor of Pathology at Loyola University, from student-conducted interview
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