A Comprehensive Assessment Of Child Care Vaccination Laws Across The US.

All fifty US states and Washington, D.C., require children from birth through age five to be vaccinated against certain communicable diseases as a condition of attending child care settings such as day care, Head Start, preschools, pre-kindergarten, and other early childhood programs. However, the nuances and implementation of these laws vary greatly across jurisdictions. To date, a comprehensive analysis of all child care vaccination laws in the US has not been performed. We have developed the first compilation of child care vaccination laws across the US. This compilation is the culmination of an exhaustive examination of multiple components of the laws, such as which vaccines are required, provisions that enable unvaccinated children to temporarily attend child care until they are fully vaccinated, attendance provisions for unvaccinated students during an outbreak, methods of enforcement of vaccination policy, and child care personnel vaccination requirements. This comprehensive analysis provides a critical and foundational framework to inform policy makers and public health professionals involved in policy planning and implementation and policy research. It provides a benchmark for further evaluation of existing and future vaccination laws and their impact on vaccine coverage rates.