Members of Senate health panel affirm faith in vaccines

WASHINGTON — Members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee united Tuesday in support of immunizing children against preventable diseases as federal health officials and senators from both parties declared vaccines a public health priority.

Senators used the hearing to showcase evidence that childhood vaccines are safe and effective, even though the hearing was scheduled before the recent measles outbreak.

"Vaccines save lives," the committee's chairman, Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said repeatedly.

"Children across the country need to be vaccinated," said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash.

With the federal government's top immunization expert at the witness table, senators took turns discrediting theories that vaccines harm children or aren't necessary. They encouraged parents from all education and income levels to immunize their kids to protect themselves and those who are medically unable to get vaccinated.

Since Jan. 1, the U.S. has seen more measles cases than in any full year since 2000, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

"When measles gets into communities of unvaccinated people in the United States, such as people who refuse vaccines for religious, philosophical or personal reasons, outbreaks are more likely to occur," Schuchat said. "New research... has found that people who seek personal belief exemptions for their children often live near one another. We think these micro-communities are making it difficult to control the spread of measles and are making us vulnerable to having the virus re-establish itself in our country again."

Also testifying was Tim Jacks, the Arizona pediatrician who has become a national figure in explaining how the current measles outbreak has threatened his own children. One is too young for the vaccine and one is fighting leukemia. They are at home under quarantine.

"Herd immunity is the only thing protecting my two young children," Jacks said.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., a member of the HELP panel, did not attend Tuesday's hearing. Paul, an ophthalmologist, drew fire from other possible 2016 presidential rivals and medical experts over comments he made Monday about vaccinations. FactCheck.org said the senator had uttered "false and misleading statements" about the dangers of vaccines.

Paul did not attend the hearing because he was attending a classified briefing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at the same time, according to his office.

Alexander said it's up to state public health departments and pediatricians to help increase childhood immunization rates, which vary state to state.

"What Congress can do is use our bully pulpit to dispel bad information and promote good information," Alexander said. "It is important from my point of view to dispel the notion that vaccines cause more problems than they solve."

Contributing: James R. Carroll, the (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal