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Ohio’s Department of Health has issued an order allowing schools to exclude healthy, unvaccinated children from in-person classes, sports and extracurricular activities for weeks at a timeβeven when they do not have any symptoms of illness.
On February 4, 2026, Ohio Department of Health Director Dr. Bruce Vanderhoff issued an order titled βApproved Means of Immunization.β Under this order, a single case of measles or rubella, or three cases of mumps or chickenpox, can trigger the exclusion of unvaccinated students. The exclusion period can begin again when additional cases are reported.
Ohio law recognizes medical and conscientious vaccination exemptions, including religious exemptions. Yet families who exercise these legal exemptions may face lengthy disruptions to their children’s education, social development and extracurricular opportunities.
We need Ohio legislators to examine this order and address its impact on healthy children and families exercising their legal right to a vaccination exemption!
TAKE ACTION
Contact your Ohio State Representative and State Senator and ask them to review the February 4, 2026, βApproved Means of Immunizationβ order and to call on Health Director Vanderhoff to rescind the provisions that exclude healthy, unvaccinated children from school and school-related activities.
You can look up who represents you at:
https://www.legislature.ohio.gov/legislators/find-my-legislators
Sample script for emails or calls is below. Personalize it by adding your own sentences and changing the wordingβpersonal letters are far more effective than form letters!
SAMPLE SCRIPT
“My name is ______ and I live in ______, Ohio. I am contacting Representative/Senator ______ regarding the Ohio Department of Health’s February 4, 2026, ‘Approved Means of Immunization’ order.
I am concerned that this order allows healthy unvaccinated children to be excluded from school for weeks at a time, even when they have no symptoms of illness.
Ohio law recognizes medical and conscientious vaccination exemptions, including religious exemptions. Families who exercise these legal exemptions should not face unnecessary disruptions to their children’s education.
Extended exclusions can deprive children of classroom instruction, social interaction and important extracurricular opportunities. They also place significant financial and childcare burdens on working families.
I am asking you to examine whether the Department of Health has exceeded its statutory authority and whether the order’s exclusion requirements are justified by the circumstances of an outbreak.
Please review this order and consider calling on Director Vanderhoff to rescind its provisions for excluding healthy students who hold lawful vaccination exemptions.
Thank you for your attention to this important issue.”
TALKING POINTS
Keep your call or email short! Pick the two or three talking points that are most important to you, and be sure to explain why this issue matters to you personally.
- Vaccines can cause serious adverse reactions in children, including severe allergic reactions, permanent injury and death. Parents should not be required to subject their children to a medical procedure against their wishes simply to keep them in school.
- Healthy children can be excluded from school for weeks at a time.Β School districts and families in Trumbull, Ashtabula, and Geauga Counties have received a letter from Director Vanderhoff outlining exclusion periods of 21 to 25 days for unvaccinated students during outbreaks of measles, mumps, rubella and chickenpox. The exclusion period may begin again when additional cases are reported, potentially keeping children out of school for extended periods.Β
- Extended school exclusions can have serious educational and developmental consequences.Β Children may miss weeks of classroom instruction, social interaction and extracurricular activities. Student athletes may also miss important competitions and opportunities to demonstrate their abilities to college recruiters, potentially affecting their chances of earning athletic scholarships.
- School exclusions place significant burdens on working families.Β Parents may be forced to miss work, arrange childcare or supervise remote learning when their healthy children are excluded from school. Repeated exclusions during an outbreak can create substantial financial and logistical challenges.
- Medical privacy must be protected.Β When a healthy student is excluded from school because of vaccination status, other students, parents and teachers may infer private information about the child’s medical history or family decisions. Schools should take appropriate steps to protect student privacy and prevent discrimination or harassment.
- Healthy children should not automatically be presumed infectious because of their vaccination status.Β Vaccination is touted as reducing the risk of infection and transmission, but vaccinated individuals still become infected with βvaccine-preventableβ diseases. https://thevaccinereaction.org/2026/09/measles-transmission-by-vaccinated-people-documented-in-medical-literature/
- Why are healthy, unvaccinated children excluded from school when adults who have not received the same vaccinations are allowed to continue teaching, preparing food, driving buses, cleaning classrooms and volunteering? School exclusion policies should be applied consistently rather than singling out healthy children simply because of their vaccination status.
- Ohio law already allows school physicians to examine and exclude children with contagious illnesses. Healthy, symptom-free children should not be sent home for weeks simply because they are unvaccinated. If an outbreak poses a serious enough threat to warrant closing a school, the policy should apply to everyone, not selectively exclude unvaccinated children.
- Excluding healthy, unvaccinated children from school places enormous pressure on parents to vaccinate, even when they have exercised their legal right to an exemption.
- The February 4 order establishes minimum ages and intervals for recognizing vaccine doses. Parents whose children received a dose five or more days before the specified minimum age may be required to have their children receive another dose. Repeated vaccination is dangerous and necessary.
MORE INFORMATION
Ohio Department of Health, βApproved Means of Immunization,β February 4, 2026:
Ohio Department of Health, September 1, 2026, letter to school districts and parents concerning outbreak-related exclusions:
For more talking points, read these articles on vaccines: https://www.westonaprice.org/health-topics/vaccines-unsafe-since-the-very-beginning/#gsc.tab=0
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