Not ‘the right time.’ NC commission rejects requiring COVID-19 shot for 17-year-olds.
A state health commission denied a request Wednesday to require North Carolina high school seniors to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
The N.C. Commission for Public Health unanimously voted against a rule-making petition from four UNC System professors to add the COVID vaccine to state immunization requirements for people who are 17 years old or who are entering 12th grade as of July 1.
The vote comes after Gov. Roy Cooper and state health leaders said it would be premature to require the vaccine at this time.
“I am a strong proponent for the vaccines,” said Dr. Ronald May, chairman of the health commission. “I do believe that they save lives and I think they prevent very, very serious illness in a great number of people.
“As I suggested, I don’t think this is the right time to address this for school-age children, and whether there will be a better time it’s yet to be seen.”
Other commission members cited reasons such as that it should be a personal choice for families and that children are less affected by COVID-19 than adults.
The vote also came as two conservative groups, Citizen Advocates For Accountable Government and Moms for Liberty, held a protest outside the state Division of Public Health’s building in Raleigh. The commission met virtually instead of in-person, citing the desire to prevent spread of COVID-19.
DHHS opposes requiring COVID shot
Under state law, the N.C Commission For Public Health is empowered to adopt rules to protect the public health, including whether to add immunization requirements for children. The commission is made up of 13 members, nine elected by the North Carolina Medical Society and four appointed by the governor.
Currently, North Carolina’s immunization requirements for children include shots for things such as chicken pox, measles, mumps and polio.
State health officials have said they wouldn’t consider making the COVID-19 vaccine a requirement for students as long as it only had emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA has only given full approval for the vaccine for 16- and 17-year-olds at this time.
“With information about vaccine doses and booster scheduling still evolving, we believe it is premature for the commission to codify the immunization schedule through rulemaking,” Dr. Kelly Kimple, chief of the state Department of Health and Human Services’ women’s and children’s health section, told the commission.
“The commission could consider adding a COVID-19 vaccine to the childhood immunization schedule at a later date.”
Cooper also publicly came out Tuesday against mandating the vaccine.
“Health officials have been looking at the mandatory nature of it,” Cooper said Tuesday. “We have a number of vaccines that are mandatory but have undergone a lot more history and scrutiny, and I think that I’m going to agree with my health officials that at this point, it’s not time to do that.”
COVID mandate for colleges
Four professors at Appalachian State University in Boone submitted a petition in October asking the commission to adopt a rule adding the COVID-19 shot for 17-year-olds to the immunization list for children.
The request comes after more than 200 UNC System faculty submitted a petition Oct. 1 asking the health commission to mandate the COVID vaccine for all students at colleges and universities in the state. While some private institutions, like Duke University, have mandated the COVID shot, the UNC System leadership has said the decision lies with the health commission.
Stella Anderson, one of the Appalachian State professors who submitted the petition, told the commission Wednesday that they’re hoping that the group can require the COVID-19 shot for UNC System schools. If not, Anderson said she wants the commission to require it for high school seniors or to say who can require it at the UNC System schools.
“If you in your judgment believe that you can go forward with a rule-making change, modified as you see fit that could be applied to the state’s four-year colleges and universities, that would be great, and that’s what we’d ask you to do,” Anderson said.
But Assistant Attorney General John Barkley said the commission doesn’t have the authority to require immunizations for college students alone. May, chairman of the commission, said it’s unclear who can approve requiring them for colleges.
COVID mandate ‘a not wise choice’
Barkley told the commission that it’s required by law to consider the petition. If the commission had approved the petition, it would have set up a process for taking public comment, with another meeting scheduled at a later date to vote on adopting the rule.
Barkley said that the commission has to give reasons in writing if it denied the petition. Several commission members were quick to offer their reasons.
“We would really be making a not wise choice to require the least affected population of this country, which would be adolescents and children, to have the most stringent requirement,” said Gene Melton, a licensed pharmacist and commission member.
Dr. Michael Riccobene said that he chose as a frontline healthcare worker to get the COVID shot. But the dentist and commission member says he’s not having his children receive the vaccine.
“I think every parent and adult should have the right to choose whether or not they receive the COVID vaccine,” Riccobene said. “I do not think it’s in the best interests of the public to take away that right.”
Dr. Douglas Sheets, a commission member, said the board of directors of the N.C. Medical Society told him they can’t currently support any COVID vaccine mandate for minors. Sheets said doctors and patients should have conversations about what’s best for the individual children.
“The system is evolving too quickly for us to mandate anything for minors at this time,” Sheets said.
This story was originally published February 2, 2022 at 11:14 AM.
