Recall petition fizzles against California State Sen. Richard Pan

Sen. Richard Pan explains why he authored the bill requiring vaccinations for schoolchildren.

AS A PEDIATRICIAN, Dr. Richard Pan has made a career caring for children. As a California state senator, he used his political position to ensure that children have the best chance to stay healthy by authoring a bill requiring vaccinations for the state's schoolchildren. 

For his efforts, opponents of Pan's bill launched a recall petition against him. His critics believed vaccines were unsafe and the law infringed on their parental rights.

Sen. Pan got a strong vote of confidence from the constituents of Senate District 6 which includes most of Sacramento, when critics were not able to get enough signatures for their recall petition.

In a statement issued Jan. 3, Pan, called the petition's failure a “victory of science over the politics of fear and intimidation” and called his opponents “anti-vaccination zealots” who “used fear, intimidation and discredited information to try to defeat our bill.”

After Gov. Jerry Brown signed Pan's legislation, Senate Bill 277, his opponents turned first tried to overturn the bill. When that effort failed, they turned their ire on the bill's author. They needed 35,926 signatures before the Dec. 31 deadline to force the recall on the 6th Senate District representative.

“Not a single signature,” said Susan Patenaude-Vigil, Yolo County’s assistant clerk-recorder.

"Vaccines are safe, and vaccines work," said Pan, who was one of the few politicians brave enough to stand up against the vocal and emotional arguments voiced by the anti-vaccination critics. "Vaccinations prevented more than 21 million hospitalizations and 732,000 deaths among children born in the last 20 years

For his leadership on the vaccination law, Time magazine called the Sacramento legislator a "hero" in an article about the vaccine debate. 

"Pan was the lead sponsor of the recently enacted Senate Bill 277, designed to raise California’s falling vaccine rate by eliminating the religious and personal belief exemptions that many parents use to sidestep the responsibility for vaccinating their children," wrote Time.

The new law, which will take effect July 1, 2016, protects every child’s right to be safe at school by preventing preventable contagions from spreading at school and in the community. 

Under the measure, children entering kindergarten or 7th grade will need to provide evidence they have received the legally required vaccines unless they have a physician-approved medical exemption. Children whose parents decide not to vaccinate them can be taught at a home-school or through independent study provided by the public school.

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