anti-vaccine bills in Iowa legislature

I heard a song entitled “Cheese and Crackers” on the Big Mo Blues Show last night. I’ve heard a few times over the years, but I never looked up what it meant until today.

The song was originally written by a rockabilly singer named Hayden Thompson, although I’ve only heard it sung by blues artist Roscoe Gordon. According to a Reddit social media thread, “Cheese and Crackers” was the B side of a record by Thompson and the A side was “Shoobie Oobie.” Thompson couldn’t find anyone to arrange the “Cheese and Crackers” lyrics at a recording studio and left in a huff, leaving the lyrics on the piano.

Roscoe found it and put it in an R&B arrangement. Billboard magazine called it the strangest new release of the week. The song is about a guy repeatedly being offered cheese and crackers although he doesn’t like or want them. According to a Wikipedia article, the term “cheese and crackers” is a kind of mild swear word chilled down from “Jesus Christ.”

That’s funny, because that’s how I feel about all the anti-vaccine bills coming out of the Iowa Legislature this year. One of them is SF 2095, which seeks to penalize private postsecondary colleges and universities if they don’t accommodate students who want to be exempt from all vaccines for any reason and to find clinical training programs who will accept them. An excerpt from the bill:

“A postsecondary school offering a degree requiring a clinical rotation shall, upon request of a student enrolled in the degree program, identify a clinical rotation placement where the student will be permitted an exemption from any vaccination requirements imposed by the placement location during the duration of the student’s clinical rotation.

A postsecondary school not in compliance shall not qualify as an eligible institution for the purposes of Iowa tuition grant.”

The other punishment could be a fine. Unless I’m looking on the web in the wrong place, I don’t find any such facility anywhere in Iowa. That would mean the postsecondary private school would be punished for something it can’t control. I’m pretty sure that would be called unjust—or maybe tricky if the goal is to coerce clinical training program leaders to loosen up their vaccine exemption policies. Right now, the only exemptions are religion or medical.

This sounds like the Iowa legislature is offering us cheese and crackers. No thank you.

This is just a quick update to the Iowa legislature anti-vaccine bills as far as which ones have passed what is called the first funnel. Here’s a link to the definition of a funnel.

Which bills got past the first funnel:

SF 2095: This bill is about private colleges or universities that would be punished if they don’t make accommodations for students in health care education program who want to avoid getting vaccines.

HF 2171: This bill would remove the requirement for children in primary and secondary schools to get vaccinations. I think this bill is dangerous and unnecessarily puts children at risk for infectious diseases including diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, poliomyelitis, rubeola, rubella, and varicella.

Which bill didn’t get past the first funnel:

HF 2287: This was the bill that sought to make vaccine manufacturers who want to sell their products in Iowa give up their immunity from lawsuits under the Childhood Vaccine Injury Act.

I couldn’t find out where the ivermectin over-the-counter bills (HF 2056 and HSB 694) were in the funnel as of today.

That make 5 bills in the Iowa legislature that are anti-vaccine-5 bills too many.