Latest news with #SenateBill277
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Measles resurgence highlights the toll of RFK Jr.'s anti-vaccine policies
After the U.S. surpassed 1,000 reported measles cases nationwide, it's clear the Trump administration is failing to protect our health and well-being. The measles outbreak in Texas is now the largest since 2000, when the country eliminated measles. And it's not yet over, threatening to make measles endemic in America again, where the risk of infection comes from within our country. Furthermore, two unvaccinated school-aged children in Texas died from measles, the first American children to die from the viral infection since 2003. Normally, a preventable infection causing avoidable deaths of children would lead to prompt government action. In 1991, I was a medical student with the U.S. Public Health Service in Philadelphia during a large measles outbreak. Over 1,000 people were infected, and nine children died. Government and public health leaders required home visits of infected children, mass immunization, education efforts and even court-mandated vaccinations. The outbreak was stopped. In Dec. 2014, a measles outbreak began at Disneyland and spread in communities with low vaccination rates. Public health action stopped this large outbreak at 125 cases. To prevent further outbreaks in California, I authored Senate Bill 277, which eliminated non-medical exemptions for school vaccines. And with further U.S. measles outbreaks in 2019, I authored Senate Bill 276 to crack down on fraudulent medical exemptions. These laws — championed by California parents demanding safe schools for children — raised statewide vaccination rates and shielded our communities. As Congress waits, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is dismantling decades of public health achievement that will make America sicker. Kennedy reduced vaccine outreach, removed key public health officials, spread disinformation from his official post and suppressed data while elevating conspiracy theorists to top positions. Kennedy and the Department of Government Efficiency fired a quarter of Health and Human Services staff, gutting the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and National Institutes of Health teams vital to outbreak response. He installed anti-vaccine extremists as advisors, including David Grier, a discredited researcher disciplined for unethical experiments on children with autism, to 'research' if vaccines cause autism, despite decades of research debunking this myth. The CDC has been muzzled: An analysis showing high rates of measles in low vaccination areas was suppressed, and dozens of Texas vaccination clinics were forced to close. When Kennedy dismantled the CDC's communication team, his former anti-vaccine organization, Children's Health Defense, filled the void with disinformation by publishing a fake CDC-branded vaccine 'safety' website that falsely linked vaccines to autism. The site mimicked official CDC design and branding, deliberately misleading the public. After news reports exposed the deception and forced the site's removal, no federal action has been taken to investigate or prosecute this unlawful impersonation of a federal agency. Furthermore, Dr. Peter Marks, the nation's top vaccine regulator who led President Donald Trump's Operation Warp Speed, refused a demand for false data on brain swelling and death caused by the Measles-Mumps-Rubella vaccine, of which there are no credible cases. Kennedy forced him to resign. In his resignation letter, Marks wrote, 'it has become clear that truth and transparency are not desired by the secretary, but rather he wishes subservient confirmation of his misinformation and lies.' And what of the dead children from measles? Kennedy dismissed the first measles death, saying 'it's not unusual.' He blamed measles on poor nutrition, called vaccines a 'personal choice' that could cause 'adverse events' and claimed Vitamin A and cod liver oil treated measles. Subsequently, many Texas children hospitalized with measles also had Vitamin A toxicity. At his first Congressional hearing, Kennedy testified, 'I don't think people should be taking medical advice from me.' He then refused to answer whether he would vaccinate a child against polio. As Health and Human Services secretary, he cravenly refuses to save Americans in a public health crisis. How many children must get sick — and even die — before Congress demands that Kennedy and the Trump administration answer for these preventable deaths and the continued spread of a preventable disease? This flu season, as flu vaccination declined, 226 children died from influenza — the highest since the 2009-10 pandemic. Other preventable and deadly diseases, including polio and whooping cough, will also return when vaccination is hampered and discouraged. Our state has made progress in raising vaccination rates, but we are not immune to Kennedy's dangerous vaccine disinformation; California has communities with enough unvaccinated people to fuel a serious outbreak. Measles outbreaks in other states makes it imperative that California strengthen our public health defenses against sparks of infection. And California needs Congress to hold President Donald Trump and Kennedy accountable for not stopping preventable disease in America. Dr. Richard Pan is a pediatrician and former California state senator who authored landmark legislation to eliminate non-medical exemptions to school vaccination requirements in response to major measles outbreaks.
Los Angeles Times
23-04-2025
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
Independent study charter schools are a soft spot in California's vaccine laws, data show
Heartland Charter School in Kern County has several dream field trips on the calendar this spring, including tours of In-N-Out Burger, an Amtrak train ride along the Central Coast and a matinee performance of 'Harry Potter and the Cursed Child' at the Hollywood Pantages. The outings may not seem unusual, but Heartland's student body differs from other California schools in one major way. Just 5% of Heartland's 810 kindergarten students received all their childhood vaccines last year, and 9% were vaccinated against measles, according to a Times analysis of data that California schools report to the state. The vaccination rate for kindergarten students across the state last year was 93.7%. Heartland is among the largest of California's independent study charter schools, which allow parents to enroll their children in the public school system but avoid the state's strict vaccine requirements by educating them at home or online. Such programs — sometimes called homeschool charters, online charters or virtual charters — boomed during the COVID-19 pandemic and offer more flexibility than a traditional school. They also serve as a legal refuge for California parents who don't want to vaccinate their children or leave the public school system. Some public health departments in the Golden State attribute declining vaccination rates to such programs, which can enroll hundreds or even thousands of children. The publicly funded schools are among the few remaining soft spots in California's stringent childhood vaccination laws, which lawmakers tightened after a measles outbreak that began at Disneyland in 2014 sickened more than 300 people. In 2015, lawmakers passed Senate Bill 277, which banned personal belief exemptions for childhood vaccinations. In 2019, they tightened scrutiny of medical exemptions for unvaccinated children. The laws still allow parents to skip immunizations for children who are enrolled in independent study programs and do not 'receive classroom-based instruction.' But the state's vaccination laws don't specify what 'classroom-based instruction' means, including whether students must be vaccinated if they attend some in-person classes offered by their school or by a third-party vendor, or if they attend school-sanctioned activities such as field trips, soccer practice or prom. 'There is a tremendous amount of gray area,' said Jeff Rice, the founder and director of Assn. of Personalized Learning Schools & Services, or APLUS+, a trade group for charter schools with students who pursue a mix of in-person, at-home and online learning. Under California's education code, a school is 'nonclassroom-based' if 80% of learning occurs off campus. When California tightened its vaccination laws, Rice said that he pressed for clarity in immunization requirements for students who don't attend traditional in-person schools five days a week. Rather than define what 'nonclassroom- based instruction' meant, he said, the state left that decision to the school boards and county education offices that regulate charter schools. Among the 100 schools that are APLUS+ members, Rice said, two-thirds of students take classes in person at least one day a week. 'Vaccinations are an issue for a small percentage of parents who have very strong and passionate feelings about it,' Rice said. Schools with low vaccination rates, he said, 'are a reflection of the values of that individual community.' According to a state Department of Education statement, the Department of Public Health oversees the California law that 'outlines the rules for mandatory immunizations.' A spokesperson for Public Health said the department 'does not have regulatory authority over this issue,' and added that 'decisions on student participation in school field trips or athletics are decided at the local level.' The U.S. is in the midst of the largest measles outbreak in six years, with 800 cases and three deaths reported in 25 states, including nine cases in California. Dr. Shannon Udovic-Constant, a pediatrician in San Francisco and the president of the California Medical Assn., said measles is 'incredibly contagious,' spreading when someone coughs or sneezes and lingering in the air for up to two hours. She said 90% of unvaccinated people who are exposed will contract measles. To be unvaccinated, she said, 'is a risk, and it's a risk you can't see.' The vast majority of unvaccinated students are enrolled in individualized education plans or independent study programs, which under state law means they don't have to be vaccinated. The number of students who reported medical exemptions granted by doctors is very low. Most of the state's largest online charter schools had low vaccination rates, but not all. River Springs Charter in Riverside County, which reported a mix of online and in-person instruction, said that 77% of its 1,036 kindergarten students were up to date on all their vaccines last year, state data show. Feather River Charter School in Sutter County, part of the Sequoia Grove Charter Alliance in Northern California, reported to state regulators that the program is 100% 'nonclassroom-based.' Last year, 18% of the school's 321 kindergarten students were up to date on all their vaccines and 21% were vaccinated against measles. Two other schools in the alliance also reported overall vaccination rates below 20% last year. The alliance's website includes a calendar featuring a 'Tween/Teen Games Meet Up' in Elk Grove, regular library visits and a masquerade-themed prom night Friday. A video posted on Feather River's Facebook shows a large group of kids attending a recent field trip to Shasta Caverns. At Visions in Education in Sacramento County, 40% of the school's 580 kindergarten students were up to date on all their shots last year and 44% were vaccinated against measles, according to state data. The school requires students in seventh grade and above to get their Tdap booster, which provides elevated immunity against tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis, or whooping cough. On its Instagram account, the school has marketed a middle school soccer club and an ice-skating field trip. Representatives for Heartland and the Sequoia Grove alliance did not respond to requests for comment. 'As a longtime part of California's public school community, our commitment to accountability includes following the state and federal laws,' Visions in Education Supt. Steve Olmos said in an emailed statement. Olmos did not address questions on whether students have to be vaccinated to participate in field trips or group sports, but said the school has a 'comprehensive system in place to ask families for their students' vaccine history at several points during their enrollment.' Former state Sen. Richard Pan, a Sacramento Democrat who wrote California's vaccine laws, said regularly gathering in person 'certainly violates the spirit of the law.' Still, he said the low vaccination rates at online charter schools didn't surprise him, because he knew when he wrote SB 277 that not every parent would vaccinate their kids. 'Having an online school or an independent study program where they're not in school with all the other kids was a deliberate option that we provided to those families,' Pan said. But, he said, getting a cohort of unvaccinated children together puts them in danger of contracting communicable disease. 'They shouldn't be doing that on a regular or frequent basis,' he said. Lance Christensen, vice president of education policy and government affairs at the California Policy Center, a conservative think tank, disputed the idea that some schools and parents are using the online programs to avoid vaccination requirements while still operating in similar ways to traditional in-person classrooms. 'There is no such thing as loopholes in the law,' Christensen said. 'They are using whatever legal means they have to do whatever they want to do. Whether I agree with it or not, I don't care.... I'm not everybody's dad.' Christensen, who unsuccessfully ran for superintendent of public instruction in 2022, said he vaccinated his five children and believes in the importance of some childhood immunizations. Like many families during the pandemic, he also enrolled his children in virtual charter schools when their Sacramento-area schools remained closed. Many families, he said, choose these schools for a variety of reasons, whether vaccine-related or because they think they offer better education than traditional in-person public schools. Tom Reusser, Sutter County Schools' superintendent, said such virtual schools were largely to blame for the county's childhood immunization rate, which, at 73%, is the state's lowest. Most of the traditional, in-person public schools in his district have reported vaccination rates largely about 95%, he said. 'Pull the charters out, and we're doing just fine,' Reusser said. Public health officials in Sutter County also attributed their decline in vaccination rates to a 'small number of charter schools and independent study students.' The 'majority' of the students enrolled in those schools don't live in the county, they said. Homeschool and online charters can enroll students from both their home counties and surrounding counties. Feather River, for example, serves students in Sutter, Butte, Yuba, Placer, Sacramento, Yolo and Colusa counties, according to the school's website. Kern County schools such as Heartland can also enroll students from San Bernardino, Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Kings, Tulare and Inyo counties, a potential attendance area of hundreds of miles. At Heartland, parents are asked to keep their children home if anyone in the household is sick, but vaccination requirements aren't mentioned. In a Q&A posted on its website, Feather River, the school in Sutter County, notes that because the school is an 'independent study program with no classroom-based instruction,' immunizations are not required. 'While you will be asked to submit an immunization form at the time of enrollment, it does not need to be complete and will not affect your enrollment status,' the website reads.
Yahoo
04-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Skeptics say Kansas Senate bill exempting tips from state income tax doesn't go far enough
Nathan Kessler, tax policy adviser at Kansas Action for Children, said a Kansas Senate bill removing tips from calculations of state taxable income would lead to inequities in the workplace and have a limited impact economically. (Kansas Reflector screen capture of Legislature's YouTube channel) TOPEKA — Kansas Restaurant and Hospitality Association president Adam Mills appreciated thinking behind a Kansas Senate bill exempting tips from state income taxes because it could put cash in the pocket of some food service industry employees. Mills just didn't believe the idea went far enough to strip away tax or regulatory barriers undermining the societal value placed on work. The state should move to exempt overtime pay from income tax, he said. Kansas needed to embrace reform that helped youth to more easily join the workforce. The bill before the Senate Assessment and Taxation Committee should be amended to address the unfairness of singling out certain employees at a restaurant for the tax break, he said. 'Work is a good and decent virtue that leads to personal integrity and societal respect,' Mills said. 'Serving and bartending is a legitimate profession. The work they do is important, but they can't do it alone. It's a total team effort to provide great food and service for our dining public.' Under Senate Bill 277 introduced by Sen. Caryn Tyson, R-Parker, the annual cost of the state income tax exemption would be an estimated $13.2 million. That figure could change if the bill was amended or if taxpayer behavior shifted so more Kansans worked in tipped positions. The proposed tax break would apply to tips reported on federal tax returns, which were the basis for determining state taxable income for Kansans. The state tax benefit would start in the 2026 tax year and an individual would be limited to a $25,000 exemption annually. The Internal Revenue Services views all tips as income subject to taxation. President Donald Trump has endorsed the idea of repealing the federal tax on tips. There have been conversations in Congress about exempting tips, but the new U.S. House budget resolution didn't mention tips or overtime compensation. U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, predicted a federal exemption could pass Congress by June as part of the president's agenda to drive domestic prosperity. A federal tax break might be included in future legislation, but absence of progress on the national level led states to consider exempting tips from state taxable income. During the Kansas Senate committee's hearing on the bill Monday, no one offered testimony in favor of the legislation. Kansas Action for Children did raise concerns. Nathan Kessler, tax policy adviser at Kansas Action for Children, said economists and tax experts across the political spectrum regarded eliminating the income tax on tips as poor public policy. He said issue of fairness existed because tips provided a waitress would be exempt, while tips to a teacher wouldn't. The distinction was likely to compel lobbyists for all sorts of industries — accountants, doctors to educators — to seek inclusion of their clients in the tip exemption, he said. 'Kansas Action for children recognizes the real need for cost-of-living relief, especially for low-income households,' Kessler said. 'If the goal is to put more money in the pockets of tipped workers there are much better ways to do that. The most efficient would be to raise the minimum wage for those workers in Kansas.' In February, Gov. Laura Kelly and Democratic leadership in the House and Senate proposed the Legislature raise the state's minimum wage to $15 per hour. The $7.25 minimum wage in Kansas hasn't been increased since 2010. In Missouri, the minimum wage stands at $13.75 per hour. Kessler said the Senate legislation would capture about 2.5% of the state's workforce if every bartender, waiter, food server, host, hairdressers, stylist, cosmetologist, manicurist, pedicurist and concierge was included. The Kansas Department of Labor estimated the median annual income for these Kansans was approximately $29,350. 'Many of these workers do not actually have a tax liability or it is so small that exempting their tipped income will offer little meaningful relief,' Kessler said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
03-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Skeptics say Kansas Senate bill exempting tips from state income tax doesn't go far enough
Nathan Kessler, tax policy adviser at Kansas Action for Children, said a Kansas Senate bill removing tips from calculations of state taxable income would lead to inequities in the workplace and have a limited impact economically. (Kansas Reflector screen capture of Legislature's YouTube channel) TOPEKA — Kansas Restaurant and Hospitality Association president Adam Mills appreciated thinking behind a Kansas Senate bill exempting tips from state income taxes because it could put cash in the pocket of some food service industry employees. Mills just didn't believe the idea went far enough to strip away tax or regulatory barriers undermining the societal value placed on work. The state should move to exempt overtime pay from income tax, he said. Kansas needed to embrace reform that helped youth to more easily join the workforce. The bill before the Senate Assessment and Taxation Committee should be amended to address the unfairness of singling out certain employees at a restaurant for the tax break, he said. 'Work is a good and decent virtue that leads to personal integrity and societal respect,' Mills said. 'Serving and bartending is a legitimate profession. The work they do is important, but they can't do it alone. It's a total team effort to provide great food and service for our dining public.' Under Senate Bill 277 introduced by Sen. Caryn Tyson, R-Parker, the annual cost of the state income tax exemption would be an estimated $13.2 million. That figure could change if the bill was amended or if taxpayer behavior shifted so more Kansans worked in tipped positions. The proposed tax break would apply to tips reported on federal tax returns, which were the basis for determining state taxable income for Kansans. The state tax benefit would start in the 2026 tax year and an individual would be limited to a $25,000 exemption annually. The Internal Revenue Services views all tips as income subject to taxation. President Donald Trump has endorsed the idea of repealing the federal tax on tips. There have been conversations in Congress about exempting tips, but the new U.S. House budget resolution didn't mention tips or overtime compensation. U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, predicted a federal exemption could pass Congress by June as part of the president's agenda to drive domestic prosperity. A federal tax break might be included in future legislation, but absence of progress on the national level led states to consider exempting tips from state taxable income. During the Kansas Senate committee's hearing on the bill Monday, no one offered testimony in favor of the legislation. Kansas Action for Children did raise concerns. Nathan Kessler, tax policy adviser at Kansas Action for Children, said economists and tax experts across the political spectrum regarded eliminating the income tax on tips as poor public policy. He said issue of fairness existed because tips provided a waitress would be exempt, while tips to a teacher wouldn't. The distinction was likely to compel lobbyists for all sorts of industries — accountants, doctors to educators — to seek inclusion of their clients in the tip exemption, he said. 'Kansas Action for children recognizes the real need for cost-of-living relief, especially for low-income households,' Kessler said. 'If the goal is to put more money in the pockets of tipped workers there are much better ways to do that. The most efficient would be to raise the minimum wage for those workers in Kansas.' In February, Gov. Laura Kelly and Democratic leadership in the House and Senate proposed the Legislature raise the state's minimum wage to $15 per hour. The $7.25 minimum wage in Kansas hasn't been increased since 2010. In Missouri, the minimum wage stands at $13.75 per hour. Kessler said the Senate legislation would capture about 2.5% of the state's workforce if every bartender, waiter, food server, host, hairdressers, stylist, cosmetologist, manicurist, pedicurist and concierge was included. The Kansas Department of Labor estimated the median annual income for these Kansans was approximately $29,350. 'Many of these workers do not actually have a tax liability or it is so small that exempting their tipped income will offer little meaningful relief,' Kessler said.
