Balancing the health of a community with the rights of individuals — a long-simmering issue that grew heated during the COVID pandemic and hasn’t cooled since — took center stage Wednesday in a hearing about a bill that would end vaccine mandates in New Hampshire public schools.
The hearing before the Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee of the House drew an overflow crowd. Sign-in sheets indicated attendees were a mix of supporters and opponents of the bill, but the supporters were more noticeable, occasionally applauding comments that denigrated pharmaceutical companies or criticized government oversight of personal choice.
The bill, HB 1811, would end all immunization requirements for children in public schools, day cares and other facilities, and states that “any political subdivision of the state of New Hampshire shall not require vaccinations under any circumstance.”
The committee is scheduled to make a recommendation on the bill next Wednesday, after which it could go to the full House for consideration.
New Hampshire currently requires school children to have vaccinations for nine diseases, with exemptions offered for religious claims or medical reasons.
As has been the case in hearings about vaccine-related legislation in past years, several doctors, nurses and other medical professionals took the stand and cautioned that weakening mandates would make it too easy for deadly diseases like measles and polio to return, years after they were virtually eradicated from the country.
State epidemiologist Dr. Benjamin Chan noted that the use of vaccines, first mandated in New Hampshire schools in the 1880s, has “driven down the rates of diseases and outbreaks to the point that we just don’t see them in a clinic setting anymore.”
He argued that the current situation in which parents can opt their children out of vaccines for religious or medical reasons is a good compromise between the needs of community health and parental choice.
“I think what we have in New Hampshire does that balance well,” he said.
A number of speakers disagreed, however.
Rep. Matt Drew, a Republican from Manchester and the bill’s prime sponsor, argued that the existence of mandates has created a dangerous backlash.
“Public trust cannot survive coercion,” Drew said. “Mandates are a clear statement of inherent mistrust. If your product is so bad that people won’t use it voluntarily, that’s a big flashing neon sign that it is probably unsafe, ineffective or both.”
He and other speakers said mandates make it virtually impossible for parents to provide “informed consent,” a basic ethical and legal process of modern medicine.
In his prepared remarks, Drew said he felt “public health has become almost a cult” that went “mad with power” during the COVID pandemic and pushes a “vaccine religion.”
Last year, the Republican-controlled legislature moved the process for deciding what vaccines are mandated. It was formerly done by the state Department of Health and Human Services but is now the decision of the House and Senate. A bill currently under consideration would remove hepatitis B from the list of diseases requiring a vaccination, following moves by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under President Trump.