CT Court Upholds State’s School Vaccine Requirements

by Donald Eng

HARTFORD, CT — A 2022 challenge to the state school vaccine laws has been dismissed, according to Attorney General William Tong.

The case, Spillane v. Lamont, had reached the state Supreme Court in 2024, though the court rejected the claims under the state and U.S. Constitutions, it remanded to Superior Court to review the plaintiff’s claims regarding the state’s Religious Freedom and Restoration Act.

“Vaccines save lives,” Tong said. “Today’s decision affirms what we have said since day one — Connecticut’s commonsense school vaccine requirements are lifesaving and lawful.”

Plaintiffs in this state court challenge had alleged that the elimination of the religious exemption violated the Connecticut and U.S. Constitutions and Connecticut’s Religious Freedom and Restoration Act. The Connecticut Supreme Court in 2024 rejected all of plaintiffs’ claims under the Connecticut and U.S. Constitutions but remanded to the Superior Court to review further the plaintiffs’ claims made pursuant to Connecticut’s Religious Freedom and Restoration Act. 

Connecticut law requires students receive certain immunizations before enrolling in school. Prior to 2021, students could apply for medical or religious exemptions to that requirement. P.A. 21-6 eliminated the religious exemption, while grandfathering students in kindergarten through grade twelve who had already received such exemptions.

Connecticut Senate leaders called the decision a win for every parent who wants to send their child to school free from the risk of measles.

“With 98.2 percent of Connecticut kindergartners vaccinated against measles, mumps, and rubella in the 2024-25 school year, our state is proof that strong school vaccine requirements work,” according to a joint statement from Senate President Pro Tempore Matin Looney, D-New Haven, and Majority Leader Bob Duff of Norwalk. “While the Trump regime hands national vaccine policy to skeptics and measles outbreaks spread in other states, we will not let Republicans in Washington undo a public health achievement that Connecticut’s doctors, nurses, and parents worked so hard to build.” 

State Sen. Saud Anwar, D-South Windsor, said he was reassured by the ruling.

“Amid rapidly changing federal vaccine standards casting confusion and doubt on the effective, life-saving tool that has helped reduce disease in our communities for decades, it is reassuring to know Connecticut’s standards will remain in place, keeping our children and communities better protected,” he said. “This will ensure Connecticut schools and families will not have to navigate the painful and tragic nature of vaccine-preventable disease outbreaks.”