After COVID-19, Knox County's kindergarten vaccine rates are below the state average

A new report from the Tennessee Department of Health shows that the state's kindergartner vaccination rates continued to plummet last year, reflecting sharply rising rates of religious exemptions that coincided with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Knox County had a 92.9% vaccination rate, which is below the state goal rate of 95%. It's also below the statewide rate for public school students of 93.5%, the lowest rate in at least five years, according to the report.

Nineteen schools in Knox County had vaccination rates below 90%, which experts say is a level that could lead to breakthrough diseases, such as measles.

In 2020, the statewide average was 95.4%. Private school student rates increased slightly from 89.4% to 91.1%.

Anderson County's rate was 95.1%, Blount County's was 92.7%, Loudon County's was 93.6% and Sevier County's was 93.8%.

Religious exemptions from required immunizations in Tennessee jumped from 1.8% in 2020 to 3% in 2022. Again, this is the highest rate in at least five years, according to the Department of Health.

"I think there's probably a kind of COVID vaccine effect that's playing a role here because I don't think it's a coincidence that the (vaccination) rates have gone down over that past couple of years when the COVID vaccine got introduced," said Dr. Joseph Gigante, a professor of pediatrics at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt. "There's been so much misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine that's kind of bled over into, or created fuel for the fire for families who are either vaccine resistant or vaccine-hesitant."

It's not just Tennessee. Public health agencies have been sounding the alarm about declining vaccination rates since the pandemic and worry that it could lead to outbreaks of dangerous vaccine-preventable viruses. A recent measles outbreak in central Ohio sickened 85 mostly unvaccinated children, 36 of whom required hospitalization, according to news reports.

While Tennessee requires six standard vaccines for children entering kindergarten (diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis; measles, mumps, rubella; hepatitis A; hepatitis B; polio; and chickenpox), many in the state's leadership have gone against scientific and medical expert advice to cast doubt on the safety of COVID-19 vaccines for children.

Last year, House Republicans asked Gov. Bill Lee to block the Department of Health from "distributing, promoting or recommending" the COVID-19 vaccine for children under 5. During the height of the pandemic, the department also scaled back outreach to teens and adolescents about COVID-19 vaccinations after some conservative lawmakers claimed the department was pressuring teens to get the shots.

The Tennessee Department of Education declined to comment on the kindergarten vaccination report, referring all questions to the state Health Department. A Health Department spokesman declined an interview request and would not make a department vaccine expert available for an interview.

Instead, Dr. Caitlin Newhouse, director of the department's Vaccine-Preventable Diseases & Immunization Program, released a statement saying the department encourages vaccinations.

"Although we don’t know all the factors contributing to this decline, we do note in the report an association with the COVID-19 pandemic and rise in reported religious exemptions," Newhouse said. "We cannot predict how immunization coverage rates will change in the future."

Dr. Steven Furr, president-elect of the American Academy of Family Physicians and a family physician in Jackson, Alabama, said the declining vaccination rates seem to be more pronounced in the South. He said some of it may be the result of COVID lockdowns that prevented people from getting their children routine checkups and shots.

He added that doctors should just talk to their patients about vaccines, listen to their concerns and explain why they're needed.

"A lot of times when I talk to people and just let them know that I personally have taken the vaccine, that my parents are taking it, the (other) kids in our office have taken them, sometimes that's more reassuring to them," Furr said.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee kindergarten vaccination rate is dropping after COVID-19