Letters to the Editor

Each one of us plays an integral role in protecting the most vulnerable among us from the virus. When we stay inside or wear a mask, we’re doing it for our loved ones. Now, when we receive the vaccine, we’ll do it for the same reasons. It’s time for all of us to take the pledge and get the vaccine!

Pan’s SB 276, which would close a loophole used by parents who have no valid medical reason not to inoculate their children, is a fair approach to reducing exemption abuse and getting school vaccination rates back up.

Re: your July 8 story, “Vaccine skeptics take shots at proposal”: As the still-grieving brother of a sibling who died of measles encephalitis at age 5, I am deeply disturbed by our governor’s comments on this subject. I thought that this matter was settled on 2015 with the passage of SB277, but it appears that the […]

EDITOR: On June 25, my wife and I went to the East Side Farmers’ Market in Petaluma. We encountered a group of people lobbying for signatures opposing Senate Bill 276. This bill would make it more difficult for parents to exempt their children from childhood immunizations by scrutinizing physicians’ spurious exemptions. The value of vaccines […]

When it comes to comparing the safety of one child against the safety of a school full of children, the school wins. People do not have a “right” to make medical decisions that affect a large number of other people.

It occurs to me that the anti-vaccine movement has this in common with the National Rifle Association: the shared assumption that their perceived rights are more important than the health and well-being of the general public.

I want to thank Pan for his brave stance defending the proven benefits of community immunity and urge our legislators and governor to pass SB276.

Andrew Wakefield, whose infamous study linking the MMR vaccine to autism was retracted by the Lancet medical journal, is not permitted to practice medicine because British authorities revoked his license.

Your article was important and accurate. The problem was the use of the word “debate” in the headline. There is no debate about the efficacy and safety of vaccines.

I strongly urge Governor Newsom to support SB 276, Dr. Richard Pan’s bill that tightens the rules for medical exemptions to school vaccination requirements.

To present Biel’s dubious reasons for opposing a vaccine bill designed to protect the health of Californians as newsworthy erodes what should be a stark divide…

If the proportion of unvaccinated children is enlarged because of inappropriate exemptions, other vulnerable children will be infected and some will die.