title:  Federal Judge Tells Anti-Vaxxers To Go F*ck Themselves, Upholds Strict California Vaccination Law
text: Anti-vaccination advocates were hoping they could continue exposing the general public to diseases that had been largely wiped out by vaccines, but a judge dashed that hope on Friday.In 2015, California dealt with a months long measles epidemic stemming from a person who was visiting Disneyland.According to the Los Angeles Times:131 California residents were believed to have been infected with measles during the outbreak that began at Disneyland, as well as at least 26 people who resided in seven other states, Canada or Mexico, after visiting the Anaheim theme park or catching the virus from someone who went there.The outbreak created a health crisis in the state, especially since some schools have immunization rates around 50 percent or lower according to state epidemiologist, Dr. Gil Chavez.Measles had been eradicated in America by 2000, but because some crackpot researcher in England published a terribly flawed study claiming that vaccines cause autism, a claim that has been thoroughly debunked by scientists, many paranoid and ignorant parents have decided not to vaccinate their kids, which is why 7 in 10 Californians who got the measles were unvaccinated. If we had higher levels of immunity in the community, this outbreak would not have happened,  Chavez said.And the risk of exposure was not just in California schools. Public health officials contacted thousands of Californians in 12 counties potentially exposed to measles, leading to warnings in airports, malls, schools, clinics and hospitals,  the Times reported.  In one hospital alone, a single person with measles exposed 14 pregnant women and 98 infants, including 44 in the neonatal intensive care unit. After California quelled the epidemic, state lawmakers went to work to make sure such an epidemic never happens again. To that effort, they took particular aim at personal and religious exemptions that anti-vaxxers have taken advantage of over the years to decline to vaccinate their kids. They soon passed a law requiring all children to be vaccinated. The only exemption allowed is if the child has a medical condition, such as a suppressed immune system, that would prevent them from getting the vaccine.But anti-vaxxers threw a hissy fit and filed a lawsuit last month in order to prevent lawmakers from protecting the public health and safety.And U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw ruled that they can go f*ck themselves and laughed them out of court because state lawmakers have a  long history of requiring children to be vaccinated as a condition to school enrollment  and  plaintiffs have not made a showing that they are entitled to the extraordinary remedy of a preliminary injunction. In short, the law will go into effect this year and now every child will be required to be vaccinated if they want to be enrolled.And that s a good thing.We cannot let irresponsible parents put the public health at risk just because they disagree with science. Measles is one of the most contagious diseases known to man and is even more contagious and deadlier than Ebola.Sixteen years ago this country had wiped out the disease within our shores, and all that effort went to waste because some parents listen more to celebrities like Jim Carrey and Jenny McCarthy than they do to doctors and scientists. That needs to change, and this California law is the first step.Featured image via CBS News