Pa. students get two extra weeks for vaccinations

Pennsylvania students are getting additional time to comply with new school immunization requirements.

State health officials on Friday extended the vaccination deadline until mid-May. Children who don’t get the required shots may not be able to attend school.
New regulations that took effect in August require all students to receive second doses of vaccines for mumps and chicken pox. Seventh-graders also must get inoculations against meningitis, tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis.

Students not in compliance when classes began last fall were given an eight-month grace period. That would have expired on Tuesday in many districts, but students now have two extra weeks.

Pennsylvania’s new vaccine guidelines put the state in line with recommendations from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.