Dear Maine Legislator,

The religious and philosophical vaccine exemptions exist for very good reason.

There is a vaccine conversation that is upsetting for many, that the Maine Legislature must enter into this week. It is a discussion that the sponsors of LD 798 are unlikely to even know of, and is easily dismissed as internet rumor. However, the topic is central to your deliberations on the removal of the religious and philosophical exemptions proposed by LD 798. Mainers will begin to testify on Wednesday, so it is incumbent upon the Maine Coalition for Vaccine Choice to to prepare you with the clinical information at this time.

There are vaccines made with, and containing, materials that are religiously and morally objectionable to some religious groups and to many individual Mainers. At the top of that list are the WI-38 and MRC-5 cell lines.

We have included the clinical information from the distributor on these two products in the links above. Please review the “General Information” carefully.

We are also including a video by Paul Offit of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, so that you may have confirmation on this matter from the principle vaccine industry spokesperson.

The WI-38 and MRC-5 cells are used to grow viruses, and are destroyed in the manufacturing process, however the residual blood products (human albumin) and DNA fragments remain in the final product as delivered. The passage of LD 798 will mandate the purchase and intake of these human derived products by Mainers who are religiously opposed to this practice, and who do not wish to do business with the industry that supplies these types of cells, in order to fully participate in society. (These cell lines have a shelf-life, so research into new cell lines, such as the new WALVAX-2, is ongoing.)

Further, there are other morally and religiously objectionable materials in vaccines that Mainers will be forced to inject to become educated Mainers. The full CDC vaccine ingredient list is here.

As we are sure you can understand, many Mainers will find the use of bovine serum and porcine tissue religiously and ethically objectionable, and we hope you can agree that they have the right to refuse products using and containing human and animal biological material with out coercion.

Because the MMR and Chicken pox vaccines contain all of these substances, the purchase and injection of these objectionable materials will become required in Maine for full participation in public life. https://www.merck.com/product/usa/pi_circulars/m/mmr_ii/mmr_ii_pi.pdf

“M-M-R ® II
(MEASLES, MUMPS, and RUBELLA VIRUS VACCINE LIVE)
DESCRIPTION
M-M-R ® II (Measles, Mumps, and Rubella Virus Vaccine Live) is a live virus vaccine for vaccination against measles (rubeola), mumps, and rubella (German measles).

M-M-R II is a sterile lyophilized preparation of (1) ATTENUVAX® (Measles Virus Vaccine Live), a more attenuated line of measles virus, derived from Enders’ attenuated Edmonston strain and propagated in chick embryo cell culture; (2) MUMPSVAX® (Mumps Virus Vaccine Live), the Jeryl Lynn™ (B level) strain of mumps virus propagated in chick embryo cell culture; and (3) MERUVAX® II (Rubella Virus Vaccine Live), the Wistar RA 27/3 strain of live attenuated rubella virus propagated in WI-38 human diploid lung fibroblasts.{1,2}

The growth medium for measles and mumps is Medium 199 (a buffered salt solution containing vitamins and amino acids and supplemented with fetal bovine serum) containing SPGA (sucrose, phosphate, glutamate, and recombinant human albumin) as stabilizer and neomycin.

The growth medium for rubella is Minimum Essential Medium (MEM) [a buffered salt solution containing vitamins and amino acids and supplemented with fetal bovine serum] containing recombinant human albumin and neomycin. Sorbitol and hydrolyzed gelatin stabilizer are added to the individual virus harvests.

The cells, virus pools, and fetal bovine serum are all screened for the absence of adventitious agents.

The reconstituted vaccine is for subcutaneous administration. Each 0.5 mL dose contains not less than 1,000 TCID50 (tissue culture infectious doses) of measles virus; 12,500 TCID50 of mumps virus; and 1,000 TCID50 of rubella virus. Each dose of the vaccine is calculated to contain sorbitol (14.5 mg), sodium phosphate, sucrose (1.9 mg), sodium chloride, hydrolyzed gelatin (14.5 mg), recombinant human albumin (≤0.3 mg), fetal bovine serum (<1 ppm), other buffer and media ingredients and approximately 25 mcg of neomycin. The product contains no preservative.”

So a central question that will be posed in the Maine Legislature this week is:

How do the sponsors of LD 798 justify removing First Amendment rights of Mainers to the free exercise of their religion by abstaining from the use of medical products made with WI-38, MRC-5, Bovine, Porcine and other objectionable materials?

These are just a few of the reasons that the removal of non-medical vaccine exemptions in Maine is unacceptable.