Recently released state data reveals that during the 2025-26 school year, around 7.1% of students in kindergarten and seventh grade, or students who changed school districts, received a vaccine exemption due to religious, medical or philosophical reasons.
Michigan’s waiver rate in 2020 was 3.4% and has climbed each year since, reaching 6.2% in 2024 before reaching a 12-year high last year when parents declined to vaccinate around 24,600 students.
The rise in waiver rates has been attributed to misinformation about vaccine effectiveness and safety spread during the COVID-19 pandemic. The state requires students to have at least six vaccinations against communicable diseases such as measles, mumps and chickenpox. That remains unchanged despite a federal executive order reducing the number of recommended vaccines from 18 to 11 diseases.
According to the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. measles cases have reached a 35-year high after being declared eliminated from the country in 2000. The Centers for Disease Control calculates 94% of those with measles were unvaccinated or their vaccination status was unknown.
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