Governor Ron DeSantis and Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph A. Ladapo announced Wednesday during a press conference that they intend to make Florida the first state to end all vaccine requirements, including for K-12 public schools.
“Who am I to tell you what your child should put into their body? I don’t have that right. Your body is a gift from God,” Ladapo said during the conference. “[The] government does not have that right, even though they want you to believe they do.”
Following thunderous applause, Ladapo explained that vaccine mandates are wrong and every one “drips with disdain and slavery.”
As a private University, UM adopts its own vaccine policies, which require new students to show proof of vaccination against certain preventable diseases. The University may choose to maintain, modify or even drop vaccine requirements independently of state policies.
Ro Pelaez, a sophomore at UM and graduate of Miami Senior High School is concerned about public safety around Miami.
“While I highly regard individual liberties, I still hold collective safety and security as most important. The lack of vaccine mandate would contradict that,” she said.
Florida school immunization requirements currently include polio, measles, mumps, rubella, chickenpox and varicella – diseases that have been largely eliminated in the U.S. because of vaccine development and campaigns. According to the World Health Organization, vaccines prevent 3.5 million to 5 million deaths every year.
Skepticism of vaccines is at an all-time high following the rapid rollout of the Covid-19 vaccine. While anti-vaccine activists and political figures like Ladapo argue for bodily autonomy, the US Supreme Court allowed cities to require residents to be vaccinated in Jacobson v Massachusetts in 1905.
Dr. Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, trustee for the American Medical Association, said in a statement that the AMA strongly opposes the plan to end vaccine mandates.
“This unprecedented rollback would undermine decades of public health progress and place children and communities at increased risk for diseases such as measles, mumps, polio and chickenpox resulting in serious illness, disability, and even death,” said Fryhofer. “While there is still time, we urge Florida to reconsider this change to help prevent a rise of infectious disease outbreaks that put health and lives at risk.”
Despite being largely eliminated, measles cases in Florida reappeared this summer. Florida has one of the lowest measles vaccination rates in the country at 88.1%. According to the CDC, 95% of the population must be vaccinated to reach herd immunity, which not only lowers the incidence of infection but protects vulnerable people who cannot be vaccinated.
Heather Rodriguez,a registered nurse and law teacher at South Dade Senior High School, says that her experiences with students and patients underscore her position of supporting vaccines.
“Every time we’re starting back at school or coming back from a break after summer or holidays we inevitably have a lot of people that are already sick,” she said. “A lot of [preventable] diseases, we don’t see for a reason. I would like to keep it that way.”
Rodriguez agrees that getting vaccinated to ultimately provide herd immunity is the best option.
“You have the choice. You can take it or not but getting vaccinated helps other people,” she said. “We’ve eradicated these horrible, horrible illnesses and they need to stay that way.”
The University of Miami did not respond to multiple requests for comment.