In the letter, the Centner Academy advised parents to consider vaccinating their children in the summer “when there will be time for the potential transmission or shedding onto others to decrease.” David Centner, one of the school’s founders, told the Washington Post that the decision was a “precautionary measure” based on “numerous anecdotal cases that have been in circulation.” He recognized that the policy might not be based on fact, but says it was introduced out of concern for the health of the school community and as an effort to “err on the side of caution.”
CDC Refutes Shedding Theory
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stresses that the conception that COVID-vaccinated individuals may pass harmful vaccine contents to others is false. “Vaccine shedding is the term used to describe the release or discharge of any of the vaccine components in or outside of the body,” writes the CDC. “Vaccine shedding can only occur when a vaccine contains a weakened version of the virus. None of the [coronavirus] vaccines authorized for use in the U.S. contain a live virus.”
School Policy Reflects ‘Profound Misunderstanding,’ Says Expert
William Schaffner, MD, an infectious disease specialist and professor of preventive medicine and health policy at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville, Tennessee, calls the school’s policy “unfortunate” based on a “profound misunderstanding among the leadership” at the school. “There is nothing communicable, contagious, or transmissible in any of the three COVID vaccines available in the U.S.,” Dr. Schaffner said. “Neither the benefits or anything potentially adverse related to the COVID vaccines can be passed on to others — such is biologically impossible.” Last April, the same school said it would not employ teachers who had been vaccinated. “It is our policy, to the extent possible, not to employ anyone who has taken the experimental COVID-19 injection until further information is known,” read an email to academy educators. More recently, the school shifted to say vaccinated teachers and employees would not be fired, but they would not be allowed to work with students. In an interview with ABC News Miami, Joshua Hill, a parent and Centner Academy employee, emphasized that the school is not anti-vaccination, just in favor of safe vaccines. “Are these vaccines, is this injection 100 percent safe?” he said. “As a parent of two children that go to this school, I’m not willing to take the chance on a question mark.”
