Vaccination rates drop to 10-year low for Michigan’s school–age children
[September 17, 2026]
By ELI NEWMAN/Bridge Michigan
The share of school-aged children in Michigan skipping regularly
scheduled shots is at its highest level in 10 years, raising fresh
questions about state rules on vaccine exemption waivers in the
post-pandemic era.
The rate of school immunization waivers climbed to 7.1% last year, up
from 6.2% in 2024, the latest in a five-year streak of worsening vaccine
participation. The period is marked by the onset of COVID-19 and a
schism in federal recommendations and evidence-based guidance.
The latest state data represents the highest exemption rates since 2010,
when 8.6% of all students in state schools got permission to miss at
least some of the routine slate of shots long recommended by the medical
community as a safe and effective means to protect against deadly
infectious diseases like whooping cough and measles.
“Schools are locations where a lot of children are together,” said Abram
Wagner, an epidemiologist with the University of Michigan School of
Public Health who researches vaccine programs. “It can be very easy to
spread vaccine-preventable diseases there, and especially for schools
which have high rates of waivers … it’s just much easier to spread these
infectious diseases.”
Kindergarten students lead the emerging trend in Michigan, with 7.7%
receiving waivers last year, compared to 6.8% in 2024. The state reports
a 7.2% waiver rate for seventh graders in 2025, while waivers granted to
students new to their districts stood at 6.6%. Nearly 25,000 students in
the state were reported to have vaccine exemptions last year. That’s out
of more than 345,000 public and private school students with complete
immunization documentation.
The state is outpacing the national average for immunization exemptions,
too.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports rates for
kindergarten students increased to 4.2% during the 2025-2026 school
year, up from 3.6% the year before. Nationally, exemption rates
increased in 41 states and the District of Columbia, with about two
dozen reporting rates exceeding 5%.
Who’s getting waivers
State data show that urban and suburban districts have the lowest waiver
rates. Kindergarten students at Ann Arbor Public Schools, Portage Public
Schools, East Grand Rapids Public Schools and Novi Community School
District, for example, have vaccination completion rates near the 95%
that health officials consider the benchmark for herd immunity.
School districts with the highest waiver rates track northward and
within rural communities, like Lapeer Community Schools, Howell Public
Schools and North Branch Area Schools, which have kindergarten waiver
rates in the double digits.
Online schools also top the list. Ninety-three of the 205 kindergarten
students at Oxford Virtual Academy were granted waivers. Oxford led the
state with the most reported waivers for kindergarten students.
Public schools had a total immunization rate of 90% in 2025, according
to MDHHS, while private school rates were at 80.9%.
Life under the waiver system
Michigan’s vaccine exemption rate dropped as low as 3.1% in 2015, as new
waiver rules took effect. The Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR),
a bipartisan state legislative committee with certain department
oversight, began requiring parents to attend a vaccine education session
with their local health department to receive exemption documentation.
After the rule’s adoption, rates remained below 4% until 2021, the first
full year after the onset of COVID-19.
Wagner said studies show waiver regulations often have a short-term
effect, but people find out how to “game the system” over time.
“They learn where the loopholes are. They learn what they can do to get
the waiver and then push forward that way,” Wagner told Bridge Michigan.
“It’s not surprising that it’s gone up, but it’s kind of taken a while
for it to go up.”
Wagner said political and cultural forces are likely prompting the
shift, with 2020 marking an “inflection point.”
In the years following the onset of the pandemic, attitudes refuting
official immunization guidance have cropped up across the state. St.
Clair County eased access to vaccine waivers this year.
Others who want to end the state’s vaccine waiver system as practiced
have found a sympathetic ear on the Michigan State Board of Education.
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 Republican board member Tom McMillin,
a former state lawmaker and JCAR chair who opposed adopting the
state’s rule mandating education sessions for immunization waivers,
called the issue “near and dear” to his heart, with many people
concerned about being “unfairly treated” for their choices.
McMillin said at a recent board meeting that his office had received
“hundreds” of emails from parents complaining that schools refuse to
accept written statements seeking to exempt their children from
vaccine requirements and they want guidance from the state health
department.
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services said the
administrative rule that went into effect in 2015 requires
certification for nonmedical exemptions by local health departments,
with waiver forms being handled by officials there.
Changing regulation
Michigan reported 16 cases of measles this summer as the US grapples
with a series of outbreaks in other states. Measles-linked deaths in
Pennsylvania have become a political flashpoint as the federal
government shifts its reporting on the disease and overall posture
on immunizations.
Last month, President Donald Trump signed an executive order calling
to reduce the number of recommended childhood vaccines from 17 to
11, earning the condemnation of senior officials of the World Health
Organization.
In response, Michigan’s chief medical executive affirmed the state’s
standing recommendation to follow the childhood vaccine schedule
established by the American Academy of Pediatrics and a dozen other
health care groups.
“We understand that shifts in federal guidance can create
uncertainty for parents and physicians, so we want to provide
clarity,” Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, chief medical executive, said at
the time.
The uncoupling of federal recommendations and the broader medical
community has shifted public perception about vaccine safety. A
Reuters/Ipsos poll released Tuesday indicates fewer Americans trust
childhood vaccines today than they did in 2020, noting a marked drop
in Republican attitudes.
Vaccine advocacy
The state’s declining vaccination participation has elicited new
advocacy efforts to reverse the trend. The Michigan for Vaccines
coalition launched this summer to improve local immunization policy,
combining the voice of public health workers, physicians and
advocates.
“We’re all linking arms and walking together on this and making sure
we are amplifying what our state frankly needs, which is pro-vaccine
policy,” coalition director Megan Petzko-Sweet told Bridge in June.
After losing her 12-week-old daughter Francesca Marie to whooping
cough in 2012, Veronica McNally has led vaccination campaigns in the
state as president of the West Blomfield-based Franny Strong
Foundation.
An attorney and director of trial advocacy at Michigan State
University, McNally said some parents focus on the dangers of
immunization without fully recognizing the risk of choosing not to
vaccinate.
“The decisions that these parents are making, whether they like it
or not, whether they appreciate it or not, are dramatically
affecting all of the other children in that community,” McNally told
Bridge.
Most parents cannot fully appreciate the risks associated with
vaccine-preventable diseases, McNally said, with medical
misinformation widely available online setting a foundation for a
worsening trend.
Previously serving as the consumer representative on the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention Advisory Committee on Immunization
Practices, McNally was removed from a federal advisory commission on
childhood vaccines earlier this year before her term expired.
She said she’s concerned about the federal shift towards “ shared
clinical decision making ” and “ informed consent ” — concepts
heralded by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr, vaccine skeptics and
the parental rights movement.
“No one can be completely informed as a lay person regarding all of
those diseases,” McNally said. “Now we have just an enormous
disruption of public health policy at the federal level, which is to
a large extent creating confusion in parents.”
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