JOINT LEGISLATIVE ACTION ALERT – April 21, 2015
From: Roy Hanson — Family Protection Ministries and Mike Smith — HSLDA
Bill: SB 277 (Pan) as amended 4/9/15
Subject: Completely eliminates personal beliefs exemption to required vaccinations for school attendance – A threat to parental rights
Position: Strongly OPPOSE
Your important Phone Calls are urgently needed!
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Information Included In This E-mail:
A. Status
B. Summary of Concern
C. Action Items
D. Opposition Points to Share with Legislators
E. Background Information
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A. Status:
SB 277 passed the Senate Health Committee on April 8th and was heard in the Senate Education Committee on April 15th. The vote in Senate Education was delayed until Wednesday, April 22nd (Tomorrow). The membership of this committee has changed since our last alert. There are two new members (Senators Runner and Monning).
Please take the actions outlined below. Even if you have already called, please call again.
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B. Summary of Concern:
SB 277 eliminates the current right for parents to exempt their child from one or more of the vaccinations required for school enrollment. The personal beliefs exemption is currently the only option available to all parents in California for exempting children from any or all of the vaccinations required for school enrollment.
SB 277 would take away the historic parental right to independently make informed voluntary decisions regarding the health care of their children, including the choice of which vaccines, if any, their children will receive. This is known as “informed consent”.
SB 277 has been amended to exclude home-based private schools from only some of the required vaccinations. SB 277 needs to be defeated because of its threat to the fundamental right of parents to direct the upbringing of their children.
Additionally, nothing would stop our Legislature from removing this partial exclusion for some homeschoolers either before this bill passes or in future legislation.
We must continue to stand firm and oppose this bill for the sake of our immediate and long-term protection of parental rights.
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C. ACTION Items:
We have prioritized the action items from top to bottom. The most critical action items are at the top of this list. As you have time, please move down the list and complete as many additional items on the list as you can. Always contact legislators as a parent and citizen. Do not call or write as a homeschooler.
1) CALL IMMEDIATELY – No later than 11am on Wednesday, April 22nd, call the member of the Senate Education Committee according to the first letter of your Last Name as indicated in the alphabetized list below. It is best to call between 9:00am and 4:00pm.
TELL THEM:
“Please vote no on SB 277 (by Pan), as recently amended because I oppose eliminating this historic right of parents to exempt their children from receiving a vaccine required for school attendance.”
2) PLEASE ALSO CONSIDER CALLING SOME OR ALL OF THE REST OF THE COMMITTEE MEMBERS ON THE LIST BELOW.
3) WRITE YOUR STATE SENATOR
a) Please write and mail a letter to the member of the Senate that represents your district. Please use this link to find out which Senator is representing your district and his or her district: http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov. Please include the following statement in your letter: “Please vote no on SB 277 (by Pan), as recently amended because I oppose eliminating this historic right of parents to exempt their children from receiving a vaccine required for school attendance.” You may also refer to the “Opposition Points to Share with Legislators” for additional ideas that you could add to your letter.
b) Please fax a copy of your letter to the Senate Education Committee at (916) 445-7799.
c) Please fax a copy of your letter to every member of the Senate Education Committee. See their fax numbers in the list below.
Notes:
- Always contact legislators as a parent and citizen. This bill directly affects all families with children.
- This is not an exclusively homeschool issue. Do not call or write as a homeschooler.
- Do not disclose the source of this Alert. All bills are available on the Internet.
- Pass this on to your friends, church, school, and group.
- Pray for a proper outcome.
For Action Items #1 above, please call the member of the Senate Education Committee according to the first letter of your last name, as indicated in the following list. If the Senator representing your district is in the following list please call them first. Then please also call as many others on this list as you can.
California State Senate Education Committee
A-B
Carol Liu (Chair)
Phone: 916-651-4025
Fax: 916-651-4925
C-D
Sharon Runner (Vice-Chair)
Phone: 916-651-4021
Fax: 916-651-4921
E-G
Marty Block
Phone: 916-651-4039
Fax: 916-651-4939
H
Loni Hancock
Phone: 916-651-4009
Fax: 916-651-4909
I-K
Connie M. Leyva
Phone: 916-651-4020
Fax: 916-651-4920
L-M
Tony Mendoza
Phone: 916-651-4032
Fax: 916-651-4932
N-R
William Monning
Phone: 916-651-4017
Fax: 916-651-4917
S-T
Richard Pan, M.D.
Phone: 916-651-4006
Fax: 916-651-4906
U-Z
Andy Vidak
Phone: 916-651-4014
Fax: 916-651-4914
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D. Opposition Points to Share with Legislators:
SB 277 is a threat to parental rights, religious liberties, and personal conscience liberties. It imposes a requirement that will take away the current guaranteed right of a parent to exempt their child from any or all vaccinations required for school enrollment.
Current law already allows for non-vaccinated students to be restricted from attending a school while there is an outbreak of particular communicable diseases.
SB 277 is a violation of the fundamental right of parents to direct the upbringing of their children.
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E. Background Information:
The following are additional but important details related to the bill.
Under current law a parent may exempt their child from any or all vaccines required for school attendance.
If SB 277 passes, all children would be required to be vaccinated with all required vaccines regardless of their risks and what the parents strongly believe is in the best interest of their child’s health and survival. SB 277 would apply to all pupils enrolled in a public or private school (including home schools). It would delete from California law the “personal beliefs exemption” from vaccinations. This eliminates the right of a parent to make decisions about whether or not to vaccinate their child based on their own personal beliefs about what is best for their child.
SB 277 would erode the traditional and God-given right of parents to make voluntary decisions in the best interest of their children in all health care decisions. SB 277 undermines this fundamental right.
Parents should be able to voluntarily choose: (1) which medical service to use for the life and health of their dependent children, (2) which provider they use for that service, and (3) which sources of information to use regarding any medical service/intervention and service provider(s).
It is wise for parents to aggressively seek out good information from multiple sources, concerning the risks of and alternatives to any medical service, prior to making a decision concerning a medical service (intervention, care, costs, etc.) for their child.
We are not taking a position on vaccinations. For more information and resources on benefits and dangers of vaccinations please visit: www.fpmca.wordpress.com/vaccination-resources .
Currently the information provided about vaccinations is heavily weighted toward sending a message that all vaccines work and are good for your children with only rare and temporary discomfort. Very little, if any, information is sent from most medical, media, and government sources on facts concerning why some vaccines have a lower rate of conferred immunity. Nor is information made readily available regarding the harmful and sometimes deadly or permanently disabling effects of particular vaccines due to their contents, and how and when and under what conditions they are given. Very few studies have been done on the long-term effects of vaccines.
Risks
In 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that vaccines are “unavoidably unsafe.” Bruesewitz v. Wyeth LLC, 131 S. Ct. 1068, 179 L.Ed.2d 1 (2011). See additional information at: www.fpmca.wordpress.com/vaccination-resources and http://www.hrsa.gov/vaccinecompensation/data.html .
Medical Exemptions
Under SB 277, the only way a child could be exempted from one or more required vaccines would be to obtain a medical exemption from a physician, which is difficult to obtain. Medical exemptions are usually given for only one vaccine at a time. They are only given after a serious reaction has already occurred from a previous vaccine or a physician determines that a vaccine is contraindicated due to allergies or some other physical condition of the child.
A medical exemption must be documented by a letter from a physician stating who the exemption is for and for what vaccine. It must specify whether it is a permanent or temporary exemption. If temporary, the exemption must state how long the temporary exemption is valid.
Religious Exemptions
No present or future religious exemption will be helpful because almost all parents are ineligible due to the very narrow restrictions. These exemptions only apply to those people who are members of a religious institution, denomination, or organized group whose official statement of belief or creed includes a prohibition against ever seeing a doctor or receiving medical treatment of any kind, no matter how serious the health emergency.
Conclusion
SB 277 is a major incremental step toward taking away the right and responsibility of parents to make decisions for the care and protection of their own children in every part of life, including medical care.
Examples of other areas in which parental rights are being undermined include the area of education (we are again battling mandatory kindergarten in a new bill: AB 713), mental health, religion and philosophy of life, social life (can a parent restrict a child from certain things on the internet, friends, books, etc., or any other influences?). Another example are the recent alarming “kidnappings” of minors for medical procedures and treatments forced on children without permission from their parents. For more information on these kinds of parental rights violations visit www.parentalrights.org .
Parents need to understand the bigger picture of what is at stake here. This isn’t just about vaccines. Regardless of what we think about any mandatory vaccine, we must protect the individual rights of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children.
This bill is a further government effort to take over what has historically been a parent’s right and responsibility – to make voluntary informed decisions that they deem are in the best interest of their minor child, concerning every area of their child’s life, including medical care. We must be vigilant to hold our ground against SB 277. Your help is key to the defense of our freedoms. Please take the above-suggested action ASAP. Quickly pass this alert on to others who might respond.
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For more information and resources on benefits and dangers of vaccinations please visit: www.fpmca.wordpress.com/vaccination-resources .
Permission is given to forward this Action Alert unaltered to your friends, church, school, and group.
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This Action Alert was sent out by
Roy Hanson and Nathan Pierce
Family Protection Ministries
PO Box 730
Lincoln, CA 95648
For information on how to contact your state assembly member and state senator, please visit: http://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov
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