NYC waives school vaccine requirement for illegal immigrant children

The revelation exhibits just one of the many issues the city has had to deal with as officials struggle to accommodate the unprecedented number of illegal migrants that have arrived in recent months.

According to the New York Post, since the summer of 2022 an estimated 11,000 migrant children have been enrolled in schools operated by the city's Department of Education.

In New York City, students in Kindergarten to Grade 5 are required to be vaccinated against diptheria, tetanus, pertussis, polio, measles, mumps, rubella, Hepatitis B, and chicken pox.

Many parents have expressed concern that the lack of vaccinations could lead to outbreaks of entirely preventable diseases. As the New York Post reports, Simon Baruch Middle School in Manhattan recently reported a case of chickenpox, after which one parent stated that five migrant children were absent for the following few days.

"When you are talking now about hundreds of children entering a school and coming from countries where we know the same childhood vaccinations are not available," the parent warned, "it's hard to not see where vulnerable families could be put at risk."

DOE policy states, as of September 2022, that asylum seeking children cannot be denied entry in city schools even if their parents can't prove that they've been vaccinated. They are given thirty days from their enrollment "to provide evidence of vaccinations or be in the process of acquiring vaccinations."

Mayor Adams said on July 21, 2022 that he could not handle the increase of migrants into NYC's homeless and public welfare programs and that it was a real "burden" to the already "overburdened shelter system." He later stated that the time has come to reconsider NYC's historic "right to shelter" laws as he could not handle the influx of illegal immigrants.