Family physicians ask administrative court to halt Florida's plan to end 4 school vaccines

A group of physicians is asking an administrative court to halt Florida's push to end the requirement that children get four vaccines to attend school.

The Florida Academy of Family Physicians filed a petition with the Division of Administrative Hearings on Friday. It alleges the Department of Health failed to follow proper procedures in moving to roll back the requirements for hepatitis B, varicella (chickenpox), Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) and pneumococcal conjugate vaccines.

The other petitioners are Dr. Danielle Carter of Jacksonville, a 70-year-old with chronic myelomonocytic leukemia who is vulnerable to viruses and is identified as T.K. in court documents; and a school nurse identified as K.O. Both are anonymous.

The petition says the "philosophical beliefs" of Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, who helped lead the push for the repeal, do not override the department's statutory mandate "to prevent the spread of communicable diseases by supervising and securing the vaccination of all children in Florida against vaccine-preventable diseases."

The requirements are an agency rule, not state law, so the department can repeal them without legislative approval.

The petition says the Department of Health "did nothing" to advance the rulemaking for 225 days, while the limit is 180 days. When rulemaking is delayed, state law requires an agency to submit a "concise statement that identifies the reasons for the delay in rulemaking" every quarter. The department sent letters to the Joint Administrative Procedures Committee on Feb. 26 and June 30 but did not give reasons for the delay, the petition argues.

"There were no legitimate reasons identified for the delay in rulemaking and the Department did not indicate that it would proceed with the issuance of a notice of proposed rule in its June 30 correspondence," the petition states.

The department held its first public meeting on the issue Dec. 12, 2025, in Panama City. On Aug. 24, it proposed a rule that followed the earlier vaccine rule almost word for word. On Sept. 30, it dropped an effort to expand exemptions from the immunization requirements and announced an Oct. 8 public meeting in Lake Mary on the change.

The academy is asking for an administrative hearing and a determination that the department acted outside its authority.

Ladapo said removing the four vaccines from state requirements would improve parents' rights and benefit the state's overall health.

"A public health system where parents are actively making decisions and choices about their health, about the health of their children, rather than just going along with something because they don't feel like they have a choice, leads to a much stronger public health system," Ladapo said.

The academy disagrees. It says the proposal is not based on "new medical or scientific evidence or data calling into question the necessity, safety, or efficacy of these vaccines." Instead, it says the move abandons "longstanding public health protections without conforming to recognized standards of medical practice, without corresponding medical or scientific justification, and in direct violation of the Department's statutory duty."

Gov. Ron DeSantis, First Lady Casey DeSantis, and Ladapo first pushed to remove all vaccine mandates more than a year ago. No legislator filed a bill in any of the 2026 legislative sessions to remove all requirements. Efforts to pass a "Medical Freedom" bill that would have expanded vaccine exemptions and required doctors to provide an alternate vaccine schedule passed the Senate but failed in the House.