[PROVE] Evacuees Pose No Increased Risk for Texas Students

[Guest guest]

[PROVE Note: As you may have seen in the news, the state of Texas is waiving

immunization requirements for children displaced by Hurricane Katrina who will

be attending school in Texas. Many of these children are from very poor

families without health care and immunizations. Louisiana ranks near the bottom

– yes – even lower than Texas – in the CDC’s manipulative inaccurate annual

immunization survey. We applaud the governor and the state for taking these

children in and recognizing that the purpose of school is to educate and not

letting the bureaucracy of vaccine mandates that plagues healthy unvaccinated

Texas children get in the way of these kids attending school.

If there were ever a population of kids that would appear to be " at risk " these

kids would be it yet below is a press release from the Texas Department of State

Health Services clearly stating that " Evacuees Pose No Increased Illness Risk

for Texas Students. " You may want to file this away for future reference when

some doctor or public health person tries to tell you your healthy

undervaccinated child living in ideal circumstances with good nutrition and

other health care poses a risk to other students. You can quote the

commissioner of health when he says " Even if some weren't vaccinated, the

vaccines the Texas kids have received would protect them against measles, mumps,

chicken pox and other vaccine-preventable illnesses, "

We've always said, if the vaccines work as well as they are advertised and

promoted to, the vaccinated should have nothing to fear from the unvaccinated or

undervaccinated. Unless of course they aren't as safe or don't really work like

parents are told...]

_________________________________________________________

From: DSHS Electronic News Service

On Behalf Of Doug McBride

Sent: Tuesday, September 06, 2005 12:09 PM

To: DSHSNEWS@...

Subject: DSHS News Release: Evacuees Pose No Increased Risk for Texas Stu dents

Texas Department of State Health Services

NEWS RELEASE

September 6, 2005

Evacuees Pose No Increased Illness Risk for Texas Students

Texas Commissioner of State Health Services , M.D., said today

that students displaced by Hurricane Katrina enrolling in Texas schools pose no

increased health risk to Texas students.

said some Texas parents have expressed concerns about health risks to

their own children from the incoming students' exposure to floodwater and their

vaccination status.

He called the concerns " understandable but unfounded. "

" Many of these kids were not exposed to floodwater, " said. " And those

who were exposed are being evaluated in the various shelters for types of

exposure and monitored for illness symptoms and are getting treatment if they

need it. Standard practice says any child, not just evacuees, who's sick should

not be sent to school. "

He also said routine in-school prevention measures such as frequent and thorough

hand washing with soap and warm water, especially after visits to the restroom

and before eating, should be practiced. " This is a critical control measure

that always should be followed, hurricane or not. "

said the primary illness threat from exposure to floodwater is tetanus,

which is not spread person-to-person. Other flood-related threats are diarrheal

illnesses such as shigellosis and salmonellosis. Symptoms of the diarrheal

illnesses usually occur within a few days of exposure.

None of the illnesses typically associated with floods is considered airborne,

he said.

In addressing concerns about vaccination status, said that immunization

requirements for school attendance in Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana are

similar to those in Texas. " Just because they didn't escape with their shot

records, doesn't mean they haven't had their shots. If they were in school in

those states, chances are they are immunized, " he said.

" Even if some weren't vaccinated, the vaccines the Texas kids have received

would protect them against measles, mumps, chicken pox and other

vaccine-preventable illnesses, " added. He also noted that there were no

pre-hurricane reports of unusual numbers of these illnesses in the areas hit by

Katrina. " In this situation, with no increased occurrence in those states,

there's no increased risk here. "

-30-

(News media: for more information contact Doug McBride, DSHS Press Officer,

Austin, .)

NOTE: The Texas Department of Health (TDH) has merged with other agencies and is

now part of the new Department of State Health Services (DSHS), resulting in the

following e-mail address format change for all employees:

firstname.lastname@....

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Dawn

PROVE(Parents Requesting Open Vaccine Education)

prove@... (email)

http://vaccineinfo.net/ (web site)

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PROVE provides information on vaccines, and immunization policies and practices

that affect the children and adults of Texas. Our mission is to prevent vaccine

injury and death and to promote and protect the right of every person to make

informed independent vaccination decisions for themselves and their family.

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This information is not to be construed as medical OR legal advice.

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