Education

Parent Claims Someone At Obama Global Prep Academy Vaccinated Her 13-Year-Old Without Permission

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A California mom said her son’s school district offered him pizza in exchange for getting vaccinated, NBC 4 reported.

Maribel Duarte said her teenage son, a student at the Barack Obama Global Prep Academy in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), came home after school with a vaccine card after someone offered him pizza in exchange for submitting to vaccination, NBC 4 reported.

“The lady that gave him the shot and signed the paper told my son, ‘Please don’t say anything. I don’t want to get in trouble,'” Duarte told NBC 4.

A LAUSD spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation that it was “currently unable to confirm that this incident occurred at Barack Obama Global Preparation Academy.”

As of Thanksgiving break, 80% of eligible students at the Barack Obama Global Prep Academy were vaccinated, according to the district’s spokesperson. LAUSD mandated the vaccine for all students age 12 and older by Jan. 10 and is reportedly planning to force those with no legal exemption into remote learning.

“With the Jan. 10, 2022, student vaccination deadline approaching, the District introduced the Safe Schools to Safe Steps Incentive Program throughout Los Angeles Unified Schools,” the district spokesperson told the DCNF. “This program offers incentives to families who upload proof of their vaccine, have an approved medical exemption, or have conditional admissions.

Duarte told NBC 4 that she is vaccinated and does not oppose the vaccine but that the situation with her son is different because “he has problems with asthma and allergy problems.”

“It hurt to know he got a shot without my permission, without knowing and without signing any papers for him to get the shot,” Duarte added.

In California, kids can’t consent to vaccination, according to attorney Jennifer Kennedy, NBC 4 reported. School vaccination programs are reportedly governed by California’s Department of Public Health and laws from the state’s legislature.

“The LAUSD does not have the power to add a vaccine to the California school schedule,” Kennedy told NBC 4. “You couldn’t do it if you were a po-dunk school district and you can’t do it if you’re LAUSD, the second largest district in the nation. You don’t have that legal authority.”

“Vaccinations are an essential part of the multi-layered protection against COVID-19 to keep our students safe and healthy for in person instruction,” LAUSD told the DCNF.