The Maine Coalition for Vaccine Choice has learned today that the bill to require Mainers to be counseled by a doctor before they can exercise their right to a philosophical vaccine school exemption will also apply to the religious exemption.  This means that parents religious beliefs will now be subject to a doctor’s oversight.  Parents choosing to opt out of the Chicken pox vaccine for example, which is grown on the MRC-5 cell line derived from aborted fetal tissue, will first have to have a doctor sign off on their religious choice before they can send their child to school.

We do not believe that a bill to force women to see a pro-life physician to be counseled and to have him sign a form for her before she would be able to terminate a pregnancy would be taken seriously in Maine, and this bill is the moral equivalent.

It is difficult to see how Representative Sanborn and the Maine Medical Association will be able to justify this intrusion into the religious life of Mainers, and our rights to exercise our First Amendment rights with out coersion.  We call on her to drop this bill and partner with parents proposing the Maine Vaccine Consumer Protection Act to make the vaccine program safer for Mainers.