10th Brooklyn School Closed For Flouting Measles Vaccine Rules

WILLIAMSBURG, BROOKLYN — Yet another Brooklyn school was closed by health inspectors this week for not following vaccination orders surrounding the measles outbreak, which continued to spread this month to nearly 600 people.

Central UTA Boys Division, a school on Wythe Avenue, was shut down on Tuesday because it was allowing staff and students who did not have proof of immunity to measles to attend school. The school also didn't give the city's Health Department its vaccination and attendance records and did not have enough staff for all of its students, inspectors found.

The school is the 10th in Brooklyn that the department has had to close since April, when it announced that schools found not in compliance would immediately be given a violation or face closure. All schools in certain zip codes have been ordered since January not to allow unvaccinated children to return to school to prevent the measles from spreading.

The measles outbreak, which started in October, has infected 588 people as of this week, mostly in the Orthodox Jewish Community in Williamsburg.

“School staff, parents, and health care providers need to continue playing their role in bringing this outbreak to an end” Health Commissioner Dr. Oxiris Barbot said. “We’ve seen our weekly case counts decline, but the reality is, this outbreak is not over, and the Health Department will continue to use all the resources and strategies available to us. We urge anyone who can get vaccinated to do so.”

Central UTA Boys Division will not be allowed to reopen until the Health department reviews and approves a "corrective action plan" that addresses its failure to comply.

All of the other nine schools that have been closed down by the health department have had their corrective action plans approved and were allowed to reopen. They are still being monitored by the department, officials said.

Certain zip codes in Brooklyn are still under an emergency order from Mayor Bill de Blasio surrounding the outbreak, which requires people that are unvaccinated to get vaccinated or face $1,000 fines. The department has given out more than 100 summonses to people that did not follow this order.

About 74 percent, or 437, of the 588 measles cases so far are in the zip codes that are under this order, though a small number of cases have been found in other neighborhoods, including12 in Sunset Park and one in Manhattan.