{"id":11608,"date":"2026-03-17T12:36:55","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T18:36:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-legislature-passes-bill-aimed-at-increasing-vaccine-access-for-children\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T19:23:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T19:23:15","slug":"colorado-legislature-passes-bill-aimed-at-increasing-vaccine-access-for-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-legislature-passes-bill-aimed-at-increasing-vaccine-access-for-children\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado Legislature passes bill aimed at increasing vaccine access for children"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"An
An information sign is displayed as a child arrives with her parent to receive the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine for children 5 to 11-years-old at London Middle School in Wheeling, Ill., Nov. 17, 2021. (Nam Y. Huh\/Associated Press file)<\/span>onset<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Colorado lawmakers are set to give final approval to a bill that would allow state childhood vaccine recommendations to rely on findings from organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics amid a shift of federal guidelines on what immunizations are appropriate for kids.<\/p>\n

Senate Bill 26-32 passed the House on Monday on a party-line vote. It passed the Senate the same way in early February.<\/p>\n

\"Colorado
Colorado state Rep. Kyle Brown, a Louisville Democrat, on the opening day of the Colorado Legislature, Jan. 14, 2026. (Lindsey Toomer\/Colorado Newsline file)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cVaccines have put diseases like polio in the history books, but we are at risk of losing decades of progress in the current uncertain federal times,\u201d Rep. Kyle Brown, a Louisville Democrat, said on the House floor last week. \u201cRecent outbreaks, including measles cases here in Colorado and across the nation, have demonstrated how quickly vaccine-preventable diseases can resurface when coverage and confidence decline.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colorado has 10 recorded measles cases in unvaccinated children so far this year, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.<\/p>\n

CDPHE and the state\u2019s health board have historically relied on the federal Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices for vaccine recommendations. SB-32 would allow the state to look to other professional medical organizations when establishing the childhood vaccine schedule. In addition to the American Academy of Pediatrics, the bill names as authorities the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Physicians, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat it allows us to do is have structure, clarity and stability for professionals based on the best available science and stability for professionals who are responsible for delivering care,\u201d Brown said during the bill\u2019s House committee hearing in February.<\/p>\n

The measure comes after federal health officials, under the direction of U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., scaled back the number of routine vaccines children should receive from 17 to 11. Kennedy is a longtime vaccine skeptic who replaced the members of ACIP with people who have doubted the safety and efficacy of vaccines.<\/p>\n

Colorado joined a multistate lawsuit against that shift of childhood immunization policy. On Monday, a federal judge in a different lawsuit blocked the changes to the vaccine schedule and Kennedy\u2019s ACIP appointments.<\/p>\n

The Colorado bill would also let pharmacists prescribe and administer vaccines. It would not create any new vaccine mandates or get rid of any vaccine exemption policies.<\/p>\n

\"An
An American flag and a Colorado flag fly at the Colorado Capitol in Denver on June 10, 2025. (Quentin Young\/Colorado Newsline)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>
Republican opposition<\/div>\n

It was amended on the House floor to remove a manufacturer liability protection, though bill opponents still worry it offers too much protection against liability for other groups. The Senate will need to vote on whether to agree with that amendment. Colorado law has liability protections for certain providers for some age groups. Bill sponsors say the bill maintains accountability for misconduct and negligence.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis bill gives providers confidence to continue offering vaccines based on medical science, while maintaining legal resources in cases of true malpractice,\u201d Rep. Lisa Feret, an Arvada Democrat, said during the bill\u2019s House committee hearing.<\/p>\n

In their arguments against the bill, House Republicans said people should be able to make a personal choice whether to vaccinate themselves or their children, made in coordination with a doctor, who knows their precise medical history. They likened the bill\u2019s tenor to the COVID-19 vaccination requirements for workers in some industries.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t feel like the state gets to mandate or adopt rules establishing a schedule of recommended immunizations,\u201d Rep. Brandi Bradley, a Douglas County Republican, said. \u201cRight now, (the bill) says \u2018recommended.\u2019 I believe this is the pathway to mandating, and I believe the people of Colorado have spoken about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cProponents of this bill seem to believe that their side is real science and what\u2019s coming out of D.C. is junk science,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Colorado joined the Governors Public Health Alliance in October to coordinate policy and share best practices for vaccines. It is one of 29 states that explicitly reject federal vaccine guidance.<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Newsline, visit www.coloradonewsline.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Diseases put \u2018in the history books\u2019 could return because of \u2018uncertain federal times,\u2019 lawmaker says<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10666,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[394,14,15,28,61,994,291],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-11608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado-legislature","tag-colorado-state-house-of-representatives","tag-colorado-state-senate","tag-headlines","tag-health","tag-trueanthem","tag-vaccines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11608"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18513,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11608\/revisions\/18513"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11608"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=11608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}