The Philadelphia City Council has agreed to raise $44 million through new taxes to provide the Philadelphia School District with enough money to maintain its existing programs.
Immediately following the council’s May 31 vote, which will increase property taxes and use-and-occupancy taxes, the board of education adopted a $1.2-billion budget for the next fiscal year.
School-district officials and the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers had conducted an extensive lobbying campaign to secure the money, noting that the district had recently set ambitious performance goals for the schools. (See Education Week, May 2, 1990.)
The rate of measles cases reported among children under the age of 5 has continued to increase during the first five months of this year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control reports.
A total of 7,653 cases of the viral disease was reported to the agency during the first 20 weeks of this year--a 40 percent increase over the number reported for the first 20 weeks of 1989. Of the 5,180 patients on whom the agency has information, 42 percent were children under the age of 5, including 13 percent who were under 1 year of age. Of the 35 suspected measles-associated deaths reported since Jan. 1, most have been of unvaccinated preschool-aged children, the cdc said.
Since 1988, the percentage of measles cases reported in children under age 5 has been increasing. In that year, 28.6 percent of the measles cases reported were in children under that age; last year, the figure was 36.7 percent, the cdc said. Conversely, the proportion of school-age children with measles has decreased, from a median of 53.3 percent between 1980 and 1988 to 46.4 percent last year, the agency said.
About 60 percent of the people with measles in 1989 were unvaccinated or inadequately vaccinated, the cdc said. A disproportionate number of the unvaccinated people with measles were preschool-aged children living in inner cities, the agency reported.
The agency has recommended that children receive a second dose of the measles vaccine upon entering school. (See Education Week, Jan. 10, 1990.)
