Parents in court over vaccination

Mother opposes father’s wish for daughter to be given standard immunisation shots

Amother and father are battling in the Family Court over whether to get their child vaccinated. The father of the girl — who was soon to start school — wanted her to get her shots, in line with Ministry of Health and World Health Organisation guidelines.

But the mother, who is strongly anti-vaccination, felt her daughter is at risk of an adverse reaction to immunisation thanks to “a strong personal and family history for dairy and gluten intolerance, eczema, food and chemical sensitivities and medication-adverse reactions”.

The father filed an application in January last year under the Care of Children Act 2004 with a two-page affidavit outlining his reasoning. In October the mother filed a 33-page affidavit in response, along with 150 pages of evidence.

These included a letter from the girl’s GP, the results of genetic testing done by a naturopath, and “information obtained from her own research on the internet”.

She also included an affidavit from Canadian professor Dr Christopher

Shaw, who is well known for his antivax views.

The mother had also sought to file evidence from two United Statesbased doctors, one of whom said the girl was at risk of allergic reactions to chemicals in the vaccines.

A preliminary hearing was held at the Waitakere Family Court in December to decide whether that evidence is admissible.

In her decision published in June, Judge Belinda Pidwell decided neither of those doctors had adequate knowledge of the New Zealand immunisation programme, neither had examined the girl directly and neither was fully credible.

Given the court had already ordered a report from a New Zealand expert, she declined the mother’s application to file extra evidence.

The judge said it was important to determine what was in the child’s best interest, pointing out there was “a heightened risk to her, and other school children, while the issue remains undetermined. [She] poses a risk to other children while she is unimmunised, and she is susceptible to a range of illnesses”.

The court has not yet decided if the girl should be immunised.