A senior at a New York high school can no longer attend class as of today, after a federal judge declined to extend a medical exemption from the school’s vaccine mandates for the current school year.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Gary Brown of the Eastern District of New York ordered a New York school district to allow Sarah Doe, who had obtained a medical exemption, to attend high school during the 2025-2026 school year.
But in a ruling issued late Wednesday in Jane Doe v. Oceanside Union Free School District, Brown denied the renewed medical exemption request for the 2026-2027 school year.
Last year, Brown granted an emergency preliminary injunction allowing Sarah to attend 11th grade without receiving the third dose of the hepatitis B (Hep B) vaccine — the only recommended shot she hadn’t taken at the time — because her severe reactions to previous doses had left her sick and disabled.
When the lawsuit was filed, at least six treating physicians certified to the school district that Sarah could be harmed by taking the shot, according to court documents. The district nonetheless repeatedly denied her exemption requests. Since then, more doctors have affirmed that assessment.
Brown said last year’s decision rested in part on a physician’s report that Sarah experienced an anaphylactic reaction to an earlier dose, and evidence she had received the first two doses and had some immunity.
Brown also based his previous decision on an appeals court precedent stating that there had never been definitive proof that hepatitis B could be transmitted through “non-parenteral” routes like saliva — meaning passed in ways not transmitted through blood or broken skin.
After attending school last year under the court order, Sarah applied for a medical exemption from the Hep B vaccine and also the second meningococcal vaccine required for this school year.
The school district again denied her request. Sarah’s lawyers responded by filing an emergency motion seeking a new court order allowing her to return to school this year.
Explaining his latest decision, Brown said this year’s circumstances were “substantially different.” This year, Sarah would be attending school without two of the mandated vaccines, instead of one. And, he said, there was insufficient medical evidence showing that she could not receive the meningococcal vaccine.
“At the end of the day, Sarah is a child who just wants to go to school,” her attorney, Sujata Gibson, told The Defender.
