Vaccine Mandates and Exemptions

Maria Teresa Marangoni
History Doctoral Program
University of Exeter

Jonathan Kuo
History of Science, Technology, and Medicine Program
University of Manchester

Abstract: Marangoni will trace how ‘vaccine’ and ‘vaccination’ have entered the realm of taboo, stigma, and shame. Discussions of vaccination are often accompanied by the speakers’ declarations of their own or their children’s vaccination status. This talk will examine the history of childhood immunization laws and mandates, and how the discourse and narratives around these have evolved over the past few decades.

Kuo will examine exemptions from state-mandated vaccination in the US, which recognizes medical, religious, and personal belief exemptions. He will pay particular attention to the personal belief exemption, which is among the most amorphous constructs in public health law, and which is available in fewer than half of US states. Such personal beliefs have been understood variously as “philosophical,” “conscientious,” and “good cause.” This talk will frame the history of the personal belief exemption in the US from two perspectives: first, as a legal tool conceptualized by anti-vaccinationists to escape compulsory vaccination within the mechanisms of governance; second, as a “grace” offered by legislators in respect of constitutional protections of religious exercise beyond the context of vaccination.

This seminar is part of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine’s Centre for History in Public Health seminar series