The Pennsylvania Department of Health proposed updating its disease outbreak regulations for the first time in 25 years.
Proposed changes include improved disease reporting, a new birth defects registry, disease outbreak response changes, updated childcare vaccine guidelines, and a statewide vaccine tracking system. The move comes while public health strategies for responding to such outbreaks has become politicized and the proposal has already triggered a fierce backlash from Republican officials and members of the public.
More than 100 comments have been submitted to the Independent Regulatory Review Commission since the proposed regulations were published in the Pennsylvania Bulletin on August 8. Comments are due by September 22.