Vaccines have a proven record of successfully keeping Mainers safe from diseases that kill, maim and disable children, as well as adults, who may be going through chemotherapy or have autoimmune conditions that render them unable to be vaccinated. Babies too young to be vaccinated are at much greater risk of severe illness or death if they catch measles or chickenpox, for example.

Maine has successfully maintained a vaccination rate of 95% or higher since the passage of LD 798 in 2019, the vaccine bill mandating vaccines for all children attending Maine public schools, allowing for a medical exemption to be granted only by a licensed physician. As of June 2025, Maine’s vaccination rate was 97%.

Religious and other exemptions to routine and lifesaving medical care result in higher rates of suffering, illness and death among children of faith-healing sects. Religion and medicine should have nothing to do with each other. A child who is not receiving vaccines is not seeing a doctor regularly. Exemptions keep authorities at bay, when other children in the home may be at risk.

People denying their children vaccines may not be making good decisions in other facets of their child’s life. Children who are getting medical care, except for vaccinations, are still in danger of contracting vaccine-preventable illness as well as passing on that illness to you or your children who have been vaccinated.

Janis Price
Peaks Island