Still, some doctors believe the state’s purported 90 percent vaccination standard is too low.
“In order for a community to have herd immunity you really need to maintain vaccination rates around 95 percent,” said Dr. Tina Tan, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Lurie Children’s Hospital in Chicago. “Otherwise, what happens is that when the rates below drop below 95 percent, you can have the reemergence or reappearance of these preventable diseases occurring in individuals that are either not vaccinated or are too young to be vaccinated.”
That’s what happened this week in Illinois when infants at a day care center in northwest suburban Illinois were diagnosed with measles.
All those children were too young to be eligible for the measles, mumps and rubella vaccination (MMR), which is traditionally administered after a child turns 1-year-old. But Cook County health officials say they expect the disease to spread.
“The cat is out of the bag,” Dr. Terry Mason, chief operating officer of the Cook County Department of Public Health said yesterday at a press conference in Oak Forest.