A4c

T h e 8'roviiice

Monday, April 3, 1995

"This vaccine is for people at high risk. Most of our s t u d e n t s aren't (intravenous) drug users, prostitutes, homosexuals or working SF.CI IEI.T Some Sunshine Coast parents in the medical field." re fuming after health officials inoculated Officials said students in Grades 9 12 signed u n d r e d s of t e e n s against h e p a t i t i s their own consent forms under the Infants vilhout parental consent. Act, which gives "informed minors" the right "Not only wasn't I informed, but the kids to agree to any medical procedure performed weren't p r o p e r l y informed either," said by a health practitioner. Michelle Graham, who found out that her 17 The liver disease Is transmitted through , ear old son had been vaccinated two days blood and body fluids. iter the fact Diane Read, the Coast Garibaldi Health
jpecla l tn The Province

$y G r e g o r y

Unit's nursing supervisor, wouldn't say how many s t u d e n t s were inoculated but added that compliance was high. A health unit source said up to 90 per cent o( the 1,027 teens In the district's three senior secondary schools got shots last month. Dave Tessier said he doesn't care about the letter of the law. "Parents should have been notified first, then we would have had an opportunity to discuss it as a family," said the Gibsons father. School boar d chairman Pat Stuart said the

move took everybody by surprise. "It would have been nice If Coast Garibaldi Health had given us some indication they were embarking on a program like this." But Dr. Paul Martiquet, medical health officer (or the region, said the province is moving t o w a r d a universal i n o c u l a t i o n program and vaccinations for preventable diseases like hepatitis are justified. "What concerns me is the Issue that teachers were not briefed," he said. "Public health nurses weren't providing full... information.'1