Getting newly required school vaccinations might be easier than you think

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ)- As you’re trying to squeeze in those last summer moments, maybe you’re also thinking about squeezing in shots before your kids go back to school.

School starts next week in some counties and many parents at Jacobson Park say their kids still need the newly required hepatitis A and meningitis vaccines.

“Just keeping up with getting ready for school and the transition, you know, I wasn’t aware of it,” Tiffani Miller said.

All school age kids need at least the first hep A dose before they can hit the books.Children 16 and older need the meningitis booster.

<jill keys, clinical services officer, rn: “This has been in the process for several years to get the regulations updated,” Lexington-Fayette County Health Department Clinical Services Officer Jill Keys said.

She says the CDC has recommended these shots for about ten years. Kentucky gave parents more than a year’s notice it was updating regulations.

“A lot of the doctors’ offices have been already vaccinating,” Keys said.

Some people say when they called their pediatrician, they learned their kids had already gotten the vaccine so before you make an appointment, check with your doctor’s office.

“I was very glad that they went ahead and did it,” Keeley Mathis, a mom and pharmacist, said.

She says she called after hearing an employee at a Berea McConald’s her family had eaten at was diagnosed with hep A.

“It’s a little scary,” Hollie Link said.

A lot of parents tell ABC 36 they’re okay with the new vaccines, hep A in particular, because they’ve heard about the outbreak affecting more than three dozen Kentucky counties.

“I just feel like it’s a good protection when you have a lot of children in a public school setting,” Miller said.

“We want to do everything we can to protect our children from diseases and things that crop up,” Link said.

Grandparent Jean Baquero says she’s for it too, but she’s not sure her daughter would be.

“She’s sort of opposed to any kind of vaccinations, but she gets the required ones. If it is required, she’ll get it,” Baquero said.

Many parents are urging others to get their kids vaccinated, if not for everyone’s health then for their own child’s.