Haley vetoes HPV vaccination bill targeted for middle-schoolers
COLUMBIA — Gov. Nikki Haley has vetoed a bill that would have allowed seventh-grade students to get a free vaccination against a sexually transmitted, cancer-causing virus.
The bill by Rep. Bakari Sellers, D-Bamberg, passed both chambers of the GOP-controlled Legislature.
The measure would have made the vaccination optional, and would have been contingent on state funding, which it is not slated to receive for the new fiscal year that starts July 1, Sellers said.
Haley said in her veto message that the bill is a “precursor to another taxpayer-funded healthcare mandate.”
She co-sponsored a bill in 2007 that would have made the vaccination mandatory.
Sellers said Haley is now using politics to overshadow an important health issue.
Read more in tomorrow’s Post and Courier. Reach Stephen Largen at 864-641-8172 and follow him on Twitter @stephenlargen.
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