Michigan Lawmakers Push 11 Bills to Strip Vaccine Choice From Families
Parents are under attack in Michigan.
This article originally appeared on The Defender and was republished with permission.
Guest post by Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D.
The 11-bill package would require parents to use a form provided by the state health department to apply for vaccine exemptions. In what one health freedom advocate described as a “huge power grab,” one of the bills would allow the state health department to set vaccine policies by considering not only CDC recommendations, but also recommendations by groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Michigan lawmakers are considering 11 bills that would make it more difficult for families to obtain exemptions from school-based vaccine requirements for their children. The legislation also likely would expose parents to public pressure to vaccinate, health freedom advocates told The Defender.
Democrats in the state’s House of Representatives this month introduced the bills as a package, “Empower Parents, Protect Communities.”
If passed, the bills would empower the state health department to set vaccine policies based on national doctor-led organizations, not just recommendations by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The bills would also require schools and daycares to track children’s vaccination data and post the results, with the kids’ names removed, where all school families can see it, such as in the school or daycare office and website.
And they would force parents who want an exemption to apply for a waiver via a state-run centralized process, and would notify schools and parents about the child’s vaccination status, and how it compares with other students in the school.
“The public should know that these bills are a radical change from Michigan’s longstanding history of respecting parental choice,” said Sarah Radtke, a leader of the Michigan Chapter of Children’s Health Defense.
She said the legislation would “shift control from parents and doctors to the state by forcing all parents into a one-size-fits-all bureaucratic pathway to claim exemption rights.”
Radtke called the bills “a partisan attempt to intimidate and shame parents who want to exercise their right to choose medical interventions for their child.”
Rep. Phil Skaggs (D-East Grand Rapids), one of the bills’ sponsors, defended the bills, telling The Defender in an email that the legislation “empowers parents to make informed choices about the health and safety of their family.” He said:
“Parents who have an infant at home or care for their ailing mother or father on the weekends, or have another child with a heart condition, have the right to know if they’re sending their student to a school where their family feels safe from contagious diseases.”
The bills don’t outright ban vaccine exemptions, “but they construct a high-friction gauntlet that renders them practically inaccessible to most families, wrote James Lyons-Weiler, Ph.D., in a Substack post about the bills.
“These bills collectively undermine not only the right to decline a medical intervention but also the right to do so without penalty, surveillance, or forced disclosure.”
Rep. Brad Paquette (R-Niles) is spearheading opposition to the package. Following a press conference held by Democrats, Paquette told The Center Square, “There was a poster on the podium that said ‘Empowering Parents, Protecting Communities’ and I agree with that completely. … But, the people that are left out of that community are those that have been injured by vaccines.”
Radtke agreed. “Concerned parents should contact their state representatives, share this article, and tell friends and family about this attempt to encroach on parental rights.”
On Dec. 10, the bills (House Bill No. 5344 through House Bill No. 5354) were referred to Michigan’s House Committee on Government Operations. As of press time, hearings have yet to be scheduled.
Bills would change law to match state health department policy
Even before lawmakers introduced the bills, Michigan parents who wanted a vaccine exemption already faced challenges, according to journalist Jeremy R. Hammond.
“For years, parents have been lied to by both the state government and public school officials about the requirements of Michigan law,” Hammond told The Defender.
“Parents are told that the law requires them to go to the local health department to attend what they perversely call a vaccine education session and obtain a certified ‘waiver’ form.”
However, under both the Revised School Code Act 451 of 1976 (Michigan Compiled Law 380.1177) and the Michigan Public Health Code (MCL 333.9208, MCL 333.9215), the exemption requirement is met “if a parent … of the child presents a written statement to the administrator of the child’s school … to the effect that the requirements of this part cannot be met because of religious convictions or other objection to immunization,” Hammond said.
In other words, Michigan law requires only that parents who seek a vaccine exemption for their child submit a written request to the school administrator, stating that they have a religious or other objection to vaccination.
Bills would ‘massively expand’ health department’s power
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) has an administrative rule, or policy, requiring a waiver. But Hammond said that as an executive agency, the health department has “no authority to impose requirements on parents beyond what is in the statute.”
Worse yet, MDHHS instructed schools to reject parents’ written exemption statements — even though the statements met the law’s requirement, Hammond said. “My own family has been harmed by this discriminatory and unlawful policy implemented by schools throughout the state,” he wrote in a blog about the issue.
Parents, including Hammond, teamed up with Michigan for Vaccine Choice to expose and challenge what MDHHS and schools have been doing. He said:
“Because parents have been organizing to fight back against this unlawful activity by the state and public school system, Michigan Democrats now want to enforce the health department’s administrative rule with amendments to the law intended to strip parents of their exemption right and forcing them to go through the health department.”
Skaggs confirmed that bills 5348 and 5349 would put the health department’s policies into law.
According to Lyons-Weiler, the bills are a “huge power grab” by the state health department. “They are looking for legislation that massively expands their authorities.”
It is unclear how the state health department may later use the vaccination data they collect, such as tailoring interventions to increase vaccine uptake in schools with low vaccination rates or tying certain school funding options to vaccination rates.
Bills would circumvent doctor-patient privacy, health freedom advocates say
Proponents of the bill repeatedly stated in their one-pager that the bills protect families’ privacy.
In Hammond’s view, the bills would circumvent doctor-patient privacy and the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which prohibits schools from sharing private student records, including vaccination records or exemptions, with third parties, including the local health department.
Here are a few highlights of what each of the bills in the “Empower Parents, Protect Communities” legislation package would do.
HB 5344 requires public schools to post students’ vaccination data, with their names removed, on the school website and in a “prominent location” in the school’s main office. It also requires schools to notify parents via email or email of the vaccination status of all students, with names removed.
HB 5345 requires childcare centers, group childcare homes and family childcare homes to track and publicly post anonymous vaccination data of enrolled children.
HB 5346 gives schools access to the health department’s vaccination registry. Lyons-Weiler said, “What was once broad public-health trend data becomes an instrument of targeted monitoring.”
HB 5347 requires parents to sign a “statement or form” on their child’s vaccination status.
HB 5348 requires parents use the state health department form when applying for a vaccine exemption.
HB 5349 requires that parents seeking a nonmedical exemption for their child to obtain the form in person from their local health department. “The language omits ‘religious conviction,’ replacing it with the sanitized ‘objection,’ a subtle shift with massive First Amendment implications,” Lyons-Weiler said.
HB 5350 requires local health officers to report vaccine coverage and exemption statistics to local governments.
HB 5351 allows the state health department to set vaccine policies by taking into consideration the recommendations of not only the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices but also the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the American College of Physicians.
HB 5352 requires the state health department to consult the Michigan advisory committee on immunizations before changing the state’s vaccine recommendations.
HB 5353 requires insurance companies to continue covering certain vaccines, even if the CDC no longer universally recommends them for children.
HB 5354 expands who is allowed to issue a “standing order” — meaning one that does not identify a specific patient and can be used for mass rollouts — for vaccines and drugs during a public health crisis.
Related articles in The Defender
Breaking: Children’s Health Defense Sues New York in Bid to Restore Religious Exemptions
‘Checkmate’: U.S. Supreme Court Delivers Huge Win for Religious Exemptions
Public Support for Religious Exemptions Nearly Doubled Over Past 6 Years
West Virginia Supreme Court to Review Religious Exemptions Case
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