VACCINATION RATES RISE WHEN STATES BUTTON UP RELIGIOUS EXEMPTION LOOPHOLES

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Unlike other kids in Massachusetts, students living in one Boston suburb won’t be able to go back to school next month unless they’ve had their chickenpox and measles shots, as well as other routine childhood vaccinations.

“Any student not fully vaccinated without exemption will be excluded from school,” Newton Public Schools Superintendent Anna Nolin wrote in a memo last month. The directive followed a chickenpox outbreak among students, as well as rising threats of measles, Nolin said.

But unvaccinated students without medical reasons to forgo the shots can still get a pass to attend class in Massachusetts: a religious exemption.