Senate sours on lemonade bill PAGE 4
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NEWS ............................... 16 Gilbert fire captain charged with molesting girl, 8.
COMMUNITY ............ 18 Gilbert native scores veterinary scholarship
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| GilbertSunNews.com
Sunday, April 28, 2019
ilbert schools at ris for measles
INSIDE
This Week
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Revered EV landmark to disappear A 2
BY JORDAN HOUSTON GSN Staff Writer
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t a time when state vaccination rates are on the decline and measles has reached epidemic proportions, almost 1 0 elementary schools in the ast Valley are at risk for an outbreak – including 33 in Gilbert. sing data from the Ari ona epartment of Health Services, the Gilbert Sun News found that 148 schools in handler, ilbert, Mesa, ueen reek and Tempe have less than 9 percent of their kindergartners vaccinated for Measles Mumps ubella. The enters for isease ontrol and revention says coverage rates below 9 percent no longer protect those who can’t be vaccinated – such as babies, people with certain medical conditions and pregnant women.
Those rates come at a time when measles — once all but eradicated — has become a worldwide epidemic. Mesa ublic chools, the state’s largest district, has the highest number of at-risk schools with 4 . handler nified chool istrict comes in second with 34; followed by Gilbert ublic chools, ueen reek nified chool istrict, 18 Tempe lementary chool istrict,12 and yrene chool istrict, si . While public schools make up the majority of at-risk schools, charters have the highest rates of vaccine e emptions, data show. The non-district schools make up the bulk of those with coverage rates at least 10 percent lower than the safety threshold. Some of the larger charter schools in that category include the enjamin ranklin harter chool- rimson and ilbert’s Ari ona
Jurors focus on mind of ilbert officer s iller
Connections Academy, each of which have more than 100 kindergartners. Will umble, e ecutive director of the Ariona ublic ealth Association, who has been studying vaccination rates in Ari ona since he was the head of the state health department in 2009, said the statistics illustrate a common theme. “There are a couple of trends we’ve seen in Ari ona over the years, said umble. “One in general is that it’s the higher income families with higher educational levels – both parents have college degrees and an income of over 100,000 – that are the ones we see choosing not to vaccinate. Not because of bad access to care but just because they decided not to. Humble no longer works with the depart-
At last!
see MEASLES page
BY JIM WALSH GSN Staff Writer
GETOUT ........................ 28 Your guests won't beef about this meal
COMMUNITY.................18 BUSINESS ..................... 22 OPINION ....................... 24 SPORTS ..........................25 GETOUT .........................27 CLASSIFIED ..................30
COMING TO GILBERT
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jury has one job left after taking nearly four months to determine that a convicted murderer was guilty of an intentional killing when he shot Gilbert police Lt. Eric Shuhandler to death nine years ago. That last decision is a weighty one, the sort likely to stay with jurors the rest of their lives; they must decided whether Christopher Angel Redondo should live or die. huhandler, a beloved ilbert officer, was gunned down during a traffic stop on an. 28, 2010, as he walked toward a pickup truck after checking edondo’s identification. “At 42, he still had a long life of family adventures ahead of him. We had no reason to believe he would not be with us,’’
Gilbert finally has its own symphony orchestra and now the challenge is to build community support. For details, see page 18. (Town of Gilbert)
see REDONDO page 6
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