7TH GRADERS MUST GET HEPATITIS SHOTS; DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH NOW REQUIRES THE VACCINE

Sixth-graders in Cape Girardeau County will be lining up for shots next week.

When school starts in the fall, all seventh-graders must have been immunized against hepatitis B, a liver disease. The Missouri Department of Health is changing the rule, which has been filed with the secretary of state's office.

Students are required to have three doses of hepatitis B vaccination before starting the seventh grade.

"We are working with all the schools in Cape County," explained Jane Wernsman, assistant director of the Cape Girardeau County Health Department. "Members of our nursing staff will be going to each school and working with school nurses."

The first school clinic is scheduled for Monday. Parents of sixth-graders throughout the county will be receiving consent forms and information about the vaccination.

An estimated 1,000 youngsters will need the immunization. The shots will be administered in the arm. They are paid for by the Missouri Department of Health.

"There may have been some students who have vaccinations, but not many," said Wernsman.

This month the first round of vaccinations will be administered. The health department will return in a month to give the second of the three-part series. The third shot in the series should be given six months following, in October or November.

While the youngsters won't have completed the three-shot series, they will be "in progress" Wernsman said. "If they are considered in progress they will not be excluded from school."

A mass inoculation like this is unusual, Wernsman said. "In the past we've always had enough time to work. But this time we got the notice in March, and these kids have to be immunized or at least started by August."

Since 1991, infants have been routinely immunized against hepatitis B. It is also required for kindergarten entrance, so most children younger than nine have been immunized.

"We are playing catch up with the adolescents," Wernsman said.

Hepatitis B is an infection of the liver that can lead to chronic liver disease, cancer and death. It can be prevented by the vaccination.

It is spread by direct contact with an infected person or his or her body fluids. Among actions that increase the danger of contracting hepatitis B are sharing earrings, getting a tattoo or body piercing.

More than one million people have chronic hepatitis B infection, and every year 240,000 people in the United States are infected, Wernsman said.