Over 1k students suspended for not having immunization records up to date
In the past week, public health has been receiving hundreds of calls from parents trying to update records
Over 1,000 elementary students in Waterloo region have been suspended for not having their immunization records up to date, according to Waterloo region public health.
Parents had until March 26 to update their children's immunization records and those who didn't have their records updated were suspended on March 27.
Public heath said 1,032 students have been suspended as of Wednesday morning.
David Aoki, manager of vaccine preventable diseases for the region said staff were noticeably busy this past week, taking phone calls from parents and vaccinating children at the region's drop-in clinics for elementary school students.
"We've seen more than 500 people in the last five business days that we've been open for clinics," Aoki told CBC News.
"We were averaging about 400 calls a day over the last week."
Why does this happen every year?
Public heath had sent out 9,595 notices to parents during the fall of 2018, but said more than half of those notices were outstanding by February 2019 and sent out 6,129 suspension orders that month.
Aoki said new students coming into the system, children getting their booster shots at age seven and parents often assuming their doctors share immunization records with public health, are some of the reason why this issue keeps happening every year.
Students without up-to-date immunization records could be suspended for up to 20 days.
However, more than half of students suspended usually go back to school a day or two after, as parents prove their children's immunization records have been updated, Aoki said.
He adds this year's suspension numbers are on par with what they have been seeing over the years, averaging between 900 and 1100 suspensions.
Public Health works with parents to get records up to date quickly to prevent or limit the length of suspension.