At last count, 7,000 Montgomery County students between sixth and ninth grade still had not gotten two state-mandated vaccines, a health official told The Examiner Monday.
And if they don’t have the shots — to protect against chicken pox and hepatitis B — by the end of the year, they will not be allowed back to class, said the county’s director of school health services.
“The regulation says that they have to have their shots by the time they return from winter break or at least prove that they have an appointment to get them,” Judy Covich said.
So far, about 33,000 of the 40,000 students who fall into the required category have been vaccinated.
As for the thousands pushing the deadline, Covich said the county is offering special clinics in addition to the regularly scheduled ones that are scattered at various sites around the county every day of the week. In each case, the shots are administered to the students free of charge. The students are simply asked to bring a parent if they are under 18 years old and to have their immunization records with them.
“What’s happening now is what happens basically every school year,” she said. “Not until the last minute do we see a big surge in people taking advantage of the clinics, so we’re trying to do everything we can to get kids who are not compliant to get it taken care of.”
For years, Maryland has mandated that this same subset of students get vaccinations for polio, measles, mumps and rubella. New this year was the requirement that sixth-, seventh-, eighth- and ninth-graders also be vaccinated against chicken pox and hepatitis B.
Vaccination clinics
» Dec. 7: Dennis Avenue Health Center. 2000 Dennis Ave., Silver Spring.
» Dec. 11: Germantown Health Center. 12900 Middlebrook Road, Germantown.
» Dec. 14: School Health Services Center. 4910 Macon Road, Rockville.
