Don’t sell your iron lung stock just yet

In 2023, the West Virginia Legislature passed and the governor signed the Equal Protection for Religion Act, which prevents the government from placing excessive limitations on the exercise of religion.

It’s sort of like the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prevents the government from restricting an individual's religious practices.

See the difference there? Neither do I.

The problem is this: This redundant and unnecessary law is now being used as a hook on which to hang other legislation, some of which endangers the health of the state’s men, women and especially children. On his second day in office, before he had even put away the paper clips and pencils, newly-elected Governor Patrick Morrisey announced a religious exemption for childhood vaccines among his first executive actions. It means that any parent can opt out of mandatory childhood vaccinations by simply exercising this so-called religious freedom.  

Morrisey’s announcement on Day 2 of his administration was quite clear. The vaccine exemption is necessary in order to enforce the Equal Protection for Religion Act. He believes that existing vaccine mandates for public school children violate that law, and he wants a plan in place to allow for religious exemptions by February 1.

“We are directing the Office of Public Health to set up a process,” he told reporters. “We believe that the Equal Protection for Religion Act strongly argues in favor of religious and conscientious exemptions.”

At present, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a fairly long list of vaccinations for children, starting at birth and continuing into adulthood. Certain vaccines are recommended for various age groups according to this chart.

The most common vaccines that most people will recognize prevent polio; chickenpox; measles, mumps and rubella; smallpox; DPT (diptheria, tetanus and pertussis or whooping cough); hepatitis B; RSV; Covid; and the flu. Some of these diseases have theoretically been eradicated, but a nurse told me that even polio could re-emerge under certain circumstances. Medical professionals have argued against religious exemptions because of the risk of the spread of these diseases. 

“It opens the door,” one doctor told a television station. “It’s like unlocking one door of a four-door car. (The car) is no longer locked.”

Before enacting this new vaccine policy, Governor Morrisey might have consulted the state’s medical experts or at least conducted a little research on disease prevention and treatment. If he had, he might have learned that there is no effective treatment to defeat a measles infection, smallpox outbreak or rubella. Over-the-counter fever reducers can help with measles symptoms while the virus runs its course. Smallpox sufferers can drink fluids, take pain and fever medication and antibiotics, but there is no quick and easy cure. And rubella? Well, no treatment shortens the course of a rubella infection.

THIS IS WHY WE HAVE VACCINES.

Instead, Morrisey plans to unleash a herd of opt-out religious anti-vaxxers into the state’s public school system, where one sick, unvaccinated child can infect other unvaccinated children who go home and infect others in their family, who then take the disease to the theater or church or the supermarket or sporting event or birthday party or any gathering of similarly unvaccinated people, and before you know it, there’s a measles epidemic under way.

It has been common practice for the deep red West Virginia Legislature to pass legislation without ever consulting professionals in the field, or – if they do consult professionals – ignoring their advice. It’s also part of West Virginia’s steady march backward into the past, guided by Trumpism, conservative lobbyists, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) or other wealthy donors who control governments in the 21^st Century.  

It’s bad enough that they passed a dubious law made unnecessary by the Bill of Rights, but now they’re spinning it off into more dangerous legislation that ignores qualified medical opinion and expands the risk of disease to our children. If Morrisey persists in driving this agenda, I’d suggest they apply this religious exemption only to private schools or home-schooled children where parents already have a choice and not to public schools that are taxpayer supported.

I’d also suggest that Morrisey’s office put in an order for a shipment of iron lungs, because without vaccines, even polio could be waiting just around the corner.

Don’t take my word for it. Read this: