Child vaccination rates dipped into dangerous territory during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, when schools were shuttered, and most doctors were only seeing emergency patients.
But instead of recovering after schools reopened in 2021, those historically low rates worsened, according to new data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Experts fear that the skepticism of science and distrust of government that flared up during the pandemic are contributing to the decrease.
According to today’s data, the percentage of U.S. children entering kindergarten with their required immunizations fell to 93% in the 2021-22 school year, 2 percentage points below recommended herd immunity levels of 95% and lower than vaccination rates in 2020-21, when many schools and doctor’s offices were closed.
