Long Island lacks herd immunity for measles — check your ZIP code

Daily Point

State ramps up efforts to fight measles amid first U.S. death in 10 years

In the wake of a Texas child’s death from measles — the first death from the disease in a decade — the New York State Health Department is ramping up its efforts to combat the deadly disease.

New York has just two measles cases currently, both in New York City. But there’s concern that the state and Long Island are not protected at a level that would induce "herd immunity" — the level which prevents the virus from spreading widely therefore protecting those who can’t be vaccinated for medical reasons or are too young to get the shot. Herd immunity requires at least 95% coverage.

But the statewide vaccination rate — calculated based on children ages 24 to 35 months who got their first measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine dose by age 2 — is just 81.2%. The vaccination rates for Nassau and Suffolk — 82% and 82.6%, respectively — are barely higher. The data was updated on Jan. 1.

A deeper dive into the region’s ZIP codes shows some pockets of Long Island that have far lower vaccination rates. The lowest rate in Nassau or Suffolk counties is in the Sea Cliff and Glen Cove ZIP code 11579, where just 53.1% of children 24 to 35 months old received one MMR shot before they turned 2. Not far ahead is Great Neck’s 11024 ZIP code, with a vaccination rate of 57.1%.

In Suffolk County, the ZIP code with the lowest rate is 11963 in Sag Harbor, with just 58.3% coverage.

At the other end of the spectrum is Old Bethpage’s 11804 ZIP code, which boasts a 97.4% MMR vaccination rate. Only one other ZIP code, Islip Terrace’s 11752, has a vaccination rate above 90%.

While the region’s vaccination rate is still low, Long Islanders are vaccinating their children more than in some other parts of the state. Yates County posted a 55.8% vaccination rate, the lowest of any county. But in Rockland County, with a 62% rate, there was worse news. ZIP code 10952, home to Monsey, posted a vaccination rate of just 41.4%, likely reflecting the generally lower vaccination rates in many Orthodox Jewish communities. And in Orange County, with a countywide rate at 64.9%, among the ZIP codes that posted particularly low rates was 10950, home to Monroe and Kiryas Joel, with a 36.2% rate.

The Health Department recommends the first dose of the MMR vaccine when a child is 12 to 15 months old, and a second shot when a child is between 4 and 6 years of age.

— Randi F. Marshall randi.marshall@newsday.com and Karthika Namboothiri karthika.namboothiri@newsday.com

Pencil Point

Democracy in distress

For more cartoons, visit www.newsday.com/250203nationalcartoons

Reference Point

Roasting the pig

From Newsday’s birth in the fall of 1940, the editorial board has been consistent in its opposition to all forms of censorship.

Eighty-four years ago this week, the board examined the issue in the context of local education, noting that residents in several "nearby" communities had criticized some textbooks as being "subversive" and some teachers for having "tended to prejudice the rising generation against enduring American values."

In a Feb. 27, 1941 piece called "Textbook Battle," the board wrote, "Surely we are not like Russia or Germany, where teachers dare not criticize anything, and writers of textbooks must follow a party line."

The board returned to the subject 16 years later to the day in its reaction to a Supreme Court decision that, as the board put it, found that "the general public could not be deprived of ‘rugged’ literature solely because it might be harmful to youth."

At issue was a Michigan law that made it a misdemeanor to sell any book or magazine "containing obscene, immoral, lewd or lascivious" material "tending to incite minors to violent or ... immoral acts."

The board termed the court’s decision "particularly apt" since it came as the Suffolk County district attorney and other county officials were trying to ban obscene literature in that county.

"The responsibility of deciding what their children should read, as does the responsibility of keeping children off the streets, rests with the parents. It is a matter that must be corrected by individual parents, not by legal quarantine," the board wrote in a Feb. 27, 1957 piece called "Freedom to Read."

"If we yield to literary censorship, we may find ourselves first, reading only children’s books, and next, reading nothing."

The Michigan case rose after the Detroit Police Department, guided by a state law that allowed the general banning of books that might "incite" children, outlawed some 250 books, including works by Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos and John O’Hara. But the decision might be best remembered nowadays for containing one of the most colorful and memorable lines ever written by a Supreme Court justice, a line that led Newsday’s 1957 editorial. It came from veteran jurist Felix Frankfurter, who wrote of Michigan taking away books for adults because they might not be appropriate for children:

"Surely, this is to burn the house to roast the pig."

Before and since, Newsday’s board has stood firmly against burning the house.

— Michael Dobie michael.dobie@newsday.com

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