Just when you think things can't get any dumber in the Sunshine State, the crazed Republican leadership that's been pretty much in charge since 1999 prove they can dumb down even further.
The GOP Morans are playing to their conspiracy-driven anti-vax MAGA base by deciding to end vaccine mandates for public schools (via Greg Allen at NPR):
Florida's governor said he'll be asking the state Legislature to repeal a statute that requires children to receive vaccines for polio, diphtheria, measles and mumps before entering school. If it passes, Florida will be the first in the nation to eliminate all vaccine mandates for children and adults.
Other vaccines, including those for chickenpox, hepatitis B and strep infections, are mandated by the state health department, as opposed to Florida's Legislature. The state's Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo said his department will soon issue rules repealing those requirements too.
"People have a right to make their own decisions," said Ladapo, who joined Gov. Ron DeSantis for the announcement on Wednesday. "If you don't want to put whatever vaccines in your body, God bless you. And I hope you make an informed decision. And that's how it should be."
These are, by the by, the same assholes whose anti-abortion stance is to take away all health care choices by women period, so where the "make their own decisions" defense then you bastards.
Public health and child health professionals condemned the move. Dr. Aileen Marty, an infectious disease expert at Florida International University, said, "This will cause havoc."
"It will cause problems for funding free vaccines for the impoverished and issues with vaccines to the rest of us due to insurance-related issues," Marty said. "It is clearly against empirical evidence of what is safest for individual children."
It's more than just the children at risk. It will be the teachers, the parents, the communities at large. Schools can be super-spreaders, which we saw happen during the beginnings of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
And here's the thing: COVID is not over. It's still out there, and not just in Florida.
And it's not just COVID, or "regular" influenza.
We're seeing the re-emergence of measles as an infectious threat after decades of thinking our nation had finally seen an end to it. But after all those decades of our medical and scientific leaders successfully promoting and encouraging vaccinations to reduce the risks, we're now in an age when medical frauds are in charge of our nation's health care and are actively shutting down every agency and means to combat infectious diseases.
It is factual to declare that Robert Kennedy Jr., that sonofabitch, is on the side of the viruses making us sick or dead.
And Florida's elected leaders like DeSantis are happy to assist RFK Jr and the other anti-vax frauds to wage war on our children and families all because their anti-science ideology convinces them their ignorance is superior to decades if not centuries of proven medical practice.
Republicans would rather have thousands of Floridians die than admit their anti-vax stances was poor pandering to their conspiracy-driven MAGA base. We're all going to pay for inept, insane leadership by a party that won't lead towards honest-to-God better health and safety for our communities.
