Seven-year-old Milan Patel receives a COVID-19 vaccine at Michele Clark High School on Nov. 12, 2021, in Chicago. /Photo by Scott Olson / Getty Images
By Jerod MacDonald-Evoy | Arizona Mirror
A Republican bill that would bar the state from making the COVID-19 vaccine a requirement for school enrollment passed out of committee Tuesday.
“Some may ask, why is this necessary now? It’s not being mandated,” Rep. Joanne Osborne, R-Goodyear, said of her bill, House Bill 2086. “I want to make sure it stays that way.”
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The bill would add “an immunization for COVID-19 or any variant of COVID-19” to the list of vaccines that cannot be required for school attendance.
Currently, Arizona law prohibits schools from requiring students to be immunized against HPV.
Last year, the legislature passed legislation that banned mask and vaccine mandates by schools, but the Arizona Supreme Court struck down the provisions that were unconstitutionally put into the state budget.
