Bid
to repeal California school vaccination law falls short
Send a link to a friend
[October 09, 2015]
By Sharon Bernstein
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - A plan to
ask voters to repeal a new California law tightening vaccination
requirements for school-age children has fallen short of signatures
needed to put the referendum on the ballot, state data showed on
Thursday.
|
The effort was part of a backlash against a bill signed into law in
June by Democratic Governor Jerry Brown that requires pupils to be
vaccinated against childhood diseases unless they have a medical
reason to refuse. It was passed after a measles outbreak among
unvaccinated people at Disneyland last year.
That law, which goes into effect next year, makes California the
third state to eliminate religious and other personal exemptions to
vaccinations.
Opponents of the new rules, some fearing a long-debunked link
between vaccines and autism, and others opposed to the state's
removal of a religious exemption for parents who want to opt out of
vaccination, vowed to take the issue to voters.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2015/Oct/09/images/ads/current/humanesociety_sda022411.png)
But a report posted Thursday on the website of Secretary of State
Alex Padilla showed the effort had garnered only about 234,000
signatures, well short of the 365,880 signatures needed for a
measure to make the November 2016 ballot.
Supporters of the initiative turned in the signatures they had
gathered at the county level last week. Thursday was the deadline
the state to provide an official count.
Tim Donnelly, a former Republican state assembly member who had
spearheaded the effort, did not immediately respond to a request for
comment on Thursday.
When it appeared that the measure would fall short last week, he
complained in a statement sent to reporters that special interests,
including pharmaceutical companies, had "gone to great lengths to
thwart campaign efforts."
[to top of second column] |
![](../images/ads/current/Symphony_122313.png)
State Senator Richard Pan, a pediatrician who faced intense
opposition as the author of the new law eliminating the personal
beliefs exemption for childhood vaccinations, including death
threats and a possible recall effort, welcomed the ballot
initiative's stumble.
"This is a major win for public health as California leads the
country in rejecting the unfounded fear and misinformation about
vaccines that has put too many people at risk for serious disease,"
Pan said.
(Editing by Eric Walsh and Ken Wills)
[© 2015 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2015 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2015/Oct/09/images/ads/current/business_directory_filler.png)
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2015/Oct/09/images/ads/current/ccaonline_lda050208.png) |