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In Salem, Democrats Will Scrap Controversial Vaccine Bill to Appease Republicans

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Hundreds of opponents of mandatory vaccinations rallied outside the Oregon Capitol in April 2019. | ELON GLUCKLICH/THE LUND REPORT
May 13, 2019

SALEM – In a dramatic turn of events, Senate Democrats agreed Monday to kill a mandatory school vaccination bill that would have given Oregon some of the country's strictest child vaccination laws.

Democrats agreed to scuttle House Bill 3063 as part of a deal to bring Republicans back to the Capitol, several Democrats in the Senate and House confirmed to The Lund Report on Monday, a week after Republicans fled Salem to deny Democrats a quorum in protest of a $2 billion tax package for schools.

The deal, which would also shelve a series of firearm regulations, was first reported by Willamette Week. It marks a sudden and stunning end to House Bill 3063, which would have removed non-medical exemptions for children to attend public and private schools, or licensed daycare facilities.

A vast majority of health care practitioners lauded HB 3063 as a common sense public health measure, given recent large measles outbreaks in Clark County and across the country that have been attributed to a rise in unfounded skepticism about vaccines' effectiveness and side effects. The bill would have reversed the state's long-standing practice of exempting children whose parents have religious or philosophical objections to vaccines, requiring school-aged children to be vaccinated against measles and other preventable diseases like mumps, rubella, polio and tetanus.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed a bill last week removing such exemptions solely for the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, amid a wave of more than 800 measles cases nationwide this year – the highest number in 25 years.

Oregon's law would have required children attending public schools to have the full schedule of vaccines approved under state and federal guidelines or a medical exemption. Those in online schools would have been exempted.

The proposal shocked HB 3063's opponents, many of them parents of the roughly 31,000 Oregon children that aren't fully vaccinated according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's recommended schedule. Opponents held two large rallies outside the Capitol in March and April, calling fears about illnesses like measles overblown and vowing to fight what they saw as the government encroaching on their freedom to make medical decisions for their children.

More than 100 opponents filled the House chamber last week when lawmakers passed HB 3063 in a 35-25 vote, sending it to the Senate, where it appeared likely to pass with most Democrats in support and Republicans opposed.

Instead, Gov. Kate Brown won't get a chance to follow Inslee, despite saying she would have signed HB 3063. A Senate Democrat said Brown briefed lawmakers about the deal to kill the bill in an effort to salvage the school funding package Monday morning, and Rep. Cheri Helt, R-Bend, who co-sponsored the bill, confirmed its death in a social media post several minutes before Republicans returned to the Senate to vote on the school funding tax.

“HB 3063 was about saving lives, protecting children+ensuring shared immunity from dangerous/preventable diseases,” Helt wrote. “Disappointing that the loudest/most extreme voices in our politics prevailed+the sensible-center/thoughtful policy-making lost.”

Democrats and Republicans were keeping tight-lipped about the agreement. Senate Democrats, Republicans, Senate President Peter Courtney's office and a spokeswoman for Brown didn't respond to requests for comment Monday afternoon.

You can reach Elon Glucklich at [email protected].

Comments

Submitted by Kurt Ferre on Mon, 05/13/2019 - 14:15 Permalink

Simply unbelievable that the Senate Democrats caved to the anti-vaxxers.  There is no other way to put it.

shameful !

Submitted by Meg Murray on Mon, 05/13/2019 - 17:48 Permalink

This is so awesome! Oregon will maintain some freedom and liberty and not be controlled by fascists hell bent into turning this country into something that would make Hitler proud. Now we need to start making vaccine manufacturers liable for their product so they will actually be concerned about safety and not just the billons that they are currently receiving. Can’t sue them! Ridiculous. How many kids die per year from the MMR vaccine? 400 on average How many have died from wild measles in 10 years in America? ZERO! That’s a big problem. Mandating these unsafe and dangerous products isn’t the answer. Making the drug companies liable is what we should be fighting for.
Submitted by Rhonda Schinke on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 06:12 Permalink

Great news for people who want to maintain medical autonomy, informed consent and the right to refuse.   A FOIA request filed for safety and efficiency data from the HHS in 2017 was ignored compelling Robert Kennedy Jr. to file a lawsuit 7/19/18 to turn over all the PRE-LICESURE data it has on safety testing of the vaccines on the children's schedule pursuant to US Code 42 USC 300AA-27C and submit to congress every 2 years.  This is the 1986 law that gave pharma blanket immunity.
HHS finally responded stating NO SUCH STUDIES HAD BEEN DONE.  They had no data.

The government has been saying for at least 32 years that vaccines are safe based on no randomized double blind placebo controlled study with a control group.  No studies at all which violates US Code.  You can read the lawsuit and Informed Consent Networks response to HHS asking specific questions in regards to the safety of the vaccines that have put into millions of children around the world at Informed Consent Action Network under government.

Submitted by Gary Duell on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 07:57 Permalink

Appears to be some confusion of the facts. Before 1963, when widespread measles vaccination began, 4-500 deaths ANNUALLY resulted from the disease, 48,000 hospitalizations and 1000 cases of encephalitis. Vaccinations resulted in a 99% reduction of these statistics. The population has doubled since. Some people would like to return to those good old days. Your freedoms end where they begin to negatively affect others.
Submitted by michael framson on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 11:10 Permalink

HB 3063 was clear violation of the Nuremberg Code of medical ethic principle of Informed Consent.  You cannot use coercion to force a medical intervention.  That is a bedrock principle which HB 3063 tossed under the bus and the children and families it would impact.  HB 3063 was a clear violation of the 2005 UN Declaration of Human Rights.  It appears that the Democratic Party is now the party of Merck, Glaxo Smith Kline, Sanofi, and Pfizer who made the bulk of the vaccines HB 3063 mandates.  Collectively those notoriously greedy companies have been fined over $7-billion dollars since 2009 for bribery, failure to notify safety, criminal fraud, and false claims. 

Submitted by Lynne Terry on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 11:18 Permalink

The bill would not have forced vaccination. I would have barred children who did not have a medical exemption from attending public school.

 

Submitted by michael framson on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 11:53 Permalink

Beg to differ.  A parrent who wanted to follow their conscience, philosophical or religious belief, would absolutely feel "coerced", forced into vaccinating their child to recieve a public education.  Coercion is a violation the Nuremberg principle of Informed Consent.  It took the Holocaust to establish that principle enshrined in medical ethics, and the D's just ignore that part of history. 

Submitted by Mary Saunders on Tue, 05/14/2019 - 15:34 Permalink

Some politicians are acting as if public property belongs to them and to those who pay tribute to them and not to ordinary people. Many of those voting for this forced injection of products from companies paying out for federal contractor misconduct stood to profit personally from sales of products and services. This used to be called conflict of interest, but in the interest of making it sound nicer, it is often called "competing" interests. It is still corruption and abuse, for those who know their genomes are at risk from these poorly tested products, and that is even before the occasional manufacturing glitches. Why is it ok to hurt healthy people for an unproven gain for the very people harmed by shot-shedding? It is cruel collateral damage, for which politicians are so famous. There are now sophisticated tests that disclose whether an infection is wild or attenuated. Many Oregonians have had to get this sophisticated, not that they wanted to.