Parents home school to avoid vaccines, fearing autism
October 22nd, 2008From USA Today:
A growing number of parents around the country have decided to home school their children because they think school-mandated immunizations can bring on autism or weaken natural immunities. Some public health officials fear that state vaccine policies exempting home-schooled children could lead to outbreaks of previously rare childhood diseases.
It is estimated that between 1 million and 2 million children are home-schooled nationwide.
Home-schooled children accounted for 25 out of 30 cases in an outbreak of measles in suburban Chicago in May, according to the CDC. In Grant County in Washington, public health officials tied 11 of 19 measles cases to unvaccinated home-schooled children.

