Action Needed to Support Vaccine Informed Consent Protection Act in Pennsylvania HB 2683 Dear Pennsylvania NVIC Advocacy Team Members, We are very excited to let you know about a great bill filed late in the session and it would be wonderful if you would take a few minutes to support by contacting your state legislators! HB 2683 was introduced on 10/1/2018 and referred to the House Committee on Health.  This bill is sponsored by Rep. Daryl Metcalfe and cosponsored by Representatives Millard, Diamond, Ryan, Keefer, Helm and Barrar. This bill would establish the Informed Consent Protection Act.  The bill would prohibit discrimination by health care practitioners and health care facilitates against patients, or parents and guardians of patients, based solely on choosing to delay or decline a vaccination.  Insurance companies would be prohibited from denying a health care practitioner participation in an insurance plan or decreasing reimbursements based on vaccination rates or the practitioner’s decision not to vaccinate.  Child protective services could not initiate an investigation on a parent or guardian for the sole reason to delay or decline a vaccine.  The bill establishes penalties for violations. A bill like this is long overdue and can set a precedent for the rest of the country. http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/billinfo/billinfo.cfm?syear=2017&sind=0&body=H&type=B&bn=2683 – text, status and history for HB 2683 Please follow the alert below provided by our friends at PCIC on the ground in PA doing the work on this and forward this email to friends and family as soon as you can to try and push this bill through.  Sign in to the NVIC Advocacy Portal at http://NVICAdvocacy.org often to track the progress of this bill and find out the next steps you can do to support passage of this bill.  Thank you! Sincerely, NVIC Advocacy Team National Vaccine Information Center http://NVIC.org and http://NVICAdvocacy.org https://nvicadvocacy.org/members/Members/ContactUs.aspx Dear Fellow Advocates, We are so very excited to announce that our legislators are responding to our concerns about vaccine choice discrimination in pediatric practices and the Informed Consent Protection Act has been introduced in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives as HB 2683! This legislation will do the following: A health care practitioner or facility will not be permitted to refuse to treat a child whose parent or guardian has chosen to delay or decline one or more vaccines. A health care practitioner may not require a patient or guardian to sign a self-incriminating waiver as a condition for continuing to provide medical care. A health care practitioner may not accept a financial incentive from an insurance or pharmaceutical company for vaccinating patients or for maintaining a certain rate of vaccinated patients within his or her medical practice. An insurer shall not deny a health care practitioner’s participation in an insurance plan or decrease their reimbursements through fines or financial penalties due to low patient vaccination rates or due to a practitioner’s decision not to vaccinate a patient. The legislation also outlines a series of fines and penalties in the event that a health care practitioner does not comply with the legislation. Passing this bill will likely be more of a marathon than a sprint, so we ask that you PLEASE strap on your sneakers and get ready to take action when these alerts come out! Today’s action step: Call your PA Representative and Senator by logging in to the NVIC Advocacy Portal at http://NVICAdvocacy.org and open the Pennsylvania State page.  Your personal representative and senator will be listed on the right side of the page automatically and you can click on their name to get their contact information. Please take a few minutes to talk with the office staff about why this legislation is NECESSARY, and, as always, share your personal story if applicable.  We know that many, many families in PA have been denied medical care from pediatric practices, so now we are asking that you make your legislators aware of your negative experience and ASK THEM TO SUPPORT HB 2683. Ask your Representative to CO-SPONSOR HB 2683. Please forward any legislative responses to NVIC Advocacy PA at PADirector@NVICAdvocacy.org or send an email to join a volunteer team in helping further vaccine choice in Pennsylvania! Discrimination in the pediatrician’s office is unethical, and it needs to be ILLEGAL. The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) works diligently to prepare and disseminate our legislative advocacy action alerts and supporting materials.  We request that organizations and members of the public forward our alerts in their original form to assure consistent and accurate messaging and effective action. Please acknowledge NVIC as originators of this work when forwarding to members of the public and like-minded organizations. To receive alerts immediately, register  at http://NVICAdvocacy.org, a website dedicated to this sole purpose and provided as a free public service by NVIC.