This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
It's not easy to find out the student immunization rate at individual Utah schools.
Each elementary school sends vaccination statistics to the Utah Department of Health, which then compiles the information on kindergarteners to look at trends at the health district and state level.
But it appears little else is done with the information.
County health departments don't use it to target vaccination campaigns at schools that are falling behind. And unless they file a public records request, parents have no access to the information on the schools their children attend.
The Salt Lake Tribune requested the data from the beginning of the 2014-2015 school year and built a database that can be searched by school. You can find that information above or at bit.ly/1Ej0Qvf.
Linda Abel, who leads the state's immunization program, said the health department hasn't made school-by-school information readily accessible because: "We haven't had an interest in it."
And yet, Abel acknowledges, the data are most powerful at the school level. If an outbreak happens, the disease will get passed from child to child in the classroom and on the playground.
Knowing the immunization exemption rate for say, Utah County, can show trends over time, but it is far less helpful for people on the front lines of public health.
Nurses at the Utah County Health Department set up regular vaccination drives in traditional public schools, but they don't target those efforts toward the elementaries that have the most unimmunized children. They also have little contact with charter and private schools, because they don't contract with the health department.
"We haven't really targeted," said Joseph Miner, the health department director.
Some health managers would like the information themselves.
Margie Golden is the director of the county's school nursing program. She said she wouldn't want her grandchildren going to a school that doesn't meet the herd immunity rate for measles or other diseases held at bay by vaccines.
"I would not choose one where they have a very low rate," Golden said.
But at this time, there's no easy place for parents to find that information. "Perhaps there should be," Golden said. "You know how parents can find test scores? Perhaps rates of [vaccine] exemptions should be posted online. I don't know why not."
Golden and her nurses see the school-level data for the traditional public schools that they interact with regularly.
That doesn't happen in Salt Lake County, where school districts employ their own nurses and have little interaction with the county health department.
Audrey Stevenson, the director of family health services in Salt Lake County, says she doesn't know what schools have lower vaccination rates than others and she doesn't know why the state doesn't provide that information. Abel said she provides the data as the state statute requires and that it is used to inform statewide efforts to encourage vaccinations.