Muna's bill considered to allow GDOE to vaccinate in schools

A bill, introduced way back on the first day of the current 35th Guam Legislature, finally made it to the session floor. The measure, introduced by Senator Louise Muna would authorize GDOE to administer vaccines in schools, although it does not mandate that students be vaccinated.

"I'm hoping that maybe our colleagues can see that really this bill was simply just to give the legal statutory authority to prevent them from any lawsuits, to prevent them from any anti-vaxers, or anybody who has a problem with their students getting vaccinated in DOE rather than a clinic. That's really all this bill was for," she explained.

"So the bill is not going to increase vaccinations in our schools because we've got compliance. What it's going to do is allow providers to come in such as the Guam Cancer Care, this was stated in the committee report, to come in and provide vaccinations that are not right now mandated by public health. So there's a big difference."

Senator Therese Terlaje was also concerned about the timing of the bill, which was introduced before the pandemic. After about an hour of debate, the measure was moved to the voting file.

Session continues tomorrow.