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KSL Newsradio's Randall Jeppeson reportingUtah's large increase in whooping cough could be linked to parents exempting their kids from getting vaccinations. A report in the Journal of the American Medical Association says states that easily allow vaccination exemptions tend to have 50% more pertussis cases than states with stricter policies.
Margie Golden supervises school nurses around Utah County and says 3% to 5% of parents here are exempting their kids out of required school immunizations, leaving them unprotected.
"The majority are personal exemptions. There's very few medical exemptions, very few religious exemptions," she said.
Golden says the biggest factor seems to be fear that an immunization will harm the child.
"Not just take everything as true they hear from neighbors or over the internet. There's a lot of misinformation on immunizations," she said.
When whooping cough or another outbreak happens, Golden says the exempted kids are excluded from school, but she says usually the disease has already spread. There have been over 130 cases of pertussis in Utah County this year alone.
