State law changes school immunization schedule

Got shots?

If your child is a kindergarten student or 11 years old this fall, there are new immunization rules to follow.

State law changed this year for students enrolling in school for 2005-06.

Put simply, kindergarten students cannot start school until their parents can show they have two MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) shots, and 11-year-olds (usually seventh-graders) cannot start without a Td (tetanus/diphtheria) booster within the past five years.

But it's not just a way to make families follow more rules.

"We're an airplane ride away from the next outbreak, so we can't let our guard down," Flathead County Community Health Director Boni Stout said, noting how easily measles can return.

While measles has been nearly eliminated in the United States, it still rears its red-spotted head outside the country. With just an airfare purchase, travelers can bring more than their carry-on luggage home.

Her point was illustrated Tuesday as the nation noted the 50th anniversary of Jonas Salk's polio vaccine breakthrough.

"It's important for them to realize why we are doing it - because the disease still exists. Polio didn't get wiped out by people not complying" with immunization laws, she said. "It's hard work, but people can still remember what polio was like.

"And tetanus is in the soil, so we're going to get it," she said of the need for tetanus-diphtheria shots. "People think we've wiped it out and we haven't."

School nurses and principals are working overtime this spring to get the word out to parents and students.

"We're sending notices to the kids," Columbia Falls school nurse Renae Ren said. "Numerous notices already have gone home with the sixth graders."

Despite her explanations, she said there was still some confusion.

Under the old state law, sixth-graders had to have a second MMR shot before enrolling. Now that MMR booster is required for kindergarten enrollment.

Under new law, seventh-graders, if they are at least 11, must have a Td booster within the prior five years.

But, Ren said, several parents confused that second MMR with the newly required second Td, and assumed their child already had met the law.

Ren responds with a clear explanation for them, hoping to avoid a heartbreaking first day of school next fall.

"They've got to go home until they get" the shot, she said. "It's an awful thing to send them home. But we have to. It's a state law, and we have nothing to do with it."

In Bigfork, school nurse Rebecca Palmquist refers parents to their family physicians or to the Flathead County Health Department for regular immunization clinics (see accompanying schedule).

"We are functioning as a notifying entity so that parents are aware" of the law changes, Palmquist said.

"Every year we notify parents of fifth-graders that are getting ready to enter the sixth grade that they will need their second MMR," as required under the old state law.

Many children, she said, already have that booster by that time but the notification helps catch the rest.

With the county clinic location right across from the school, Palmquist said the school in the past has made arrangements with the health department and simply walked students over on a prearranged day, after getting permission from parents who want their children to have the immunizations.

. . .

Here's what students need:

. DTaP (diphtheria/tetanus/acellular pertussis or whooping cough) - Most children have five DTaP shots by school age, but the state will accept four if the final one is administered after their fourth birthday.

. Polio - Most children have four when they start school, but the state accepts three if the final one comes after their fourth birthday.

. MMR (measles/mumps/rubella) - An initial immunization usually comes at 12 months, and a booster as young as 13 months. Having both before starting kindergarten is a new state requirement.

. Td (tetanus/diphtheria) - In addition to the early immunizations, state law now requires a booster by seventh grade if it's been at least five years since the last dose and the child is 11 or older. If the third Td dose was given at age 7 or older, the child will not need another one for school entrance; the recommendation then is for 10-year intervals.

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com