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Your choices

The law allows each choice below. Read what each one covers.

An exemption is a paper that says a shot rule does not apply to this person.

Before you decide: what each shot is for, and your rights

Choice 1. The shot record
You do
1.Ask the doctor's office or the health department for a copy.2.Put one copy for each student in your folder.
The paper
The shot record from the doctor's office or the health department.
Choice 2. Medical exemption
The state says
The shot law has one exemption: medical.An exemption is a paper that lets a child skip a shot.A licensed doctor must say in writing that a shot is not safe for your child.Or that it needs extra care.The state decides.The law lets a state doctor, the Immunization Officer, do it.If the answer is no, you can appeal to the State Health Officer.
You do
1.Ask a licensed doctor to certify, in writing, which shot is not safe and why.2.Send that with your request to the state health office.3.Keep the state's answer, and give the school or center a copy.
The paper
Medical exemption decided by the state health office or its Immunization Officer, with a licensed physician's certification. A doctor signs it. How long it lasts: The law lets the state grant, renew, limit or end an exemption, and names no set term.
Source. code.wvlegislature.gov

Also in the law, with limits

Religious exemption
The state says
The shot law has no religious exemption.One exists only by the governor's order of January 14, 2025.The state health office still grants it, one school year at a time.It covers schools and child care centers the state regulates.Public schools are not taking it.On December 2, 2025, the state school board told county boards not to.That order stands until the state Supreme Court says more.On October 5, 2026, the court said it will hear the case. No date is set.
You do
1.Write a letter. Sign it in ink, on paper.Put in these things:your child's name and date of birthyour name and mailing address

Everywhere in America

Where a shot record actually gets asked for, and where it does not.

School enrollment: Enrolling a child in a school, public, private or religious, means handing that school an immunization certificate or an exemption, because each state writes its own school rule.
Licensed daycare and preschool: A state's school rule usually reaches licensed child care too, and the word that decides it is licensed. A drop in nursery or a parents day out below the licensing line is usually outside it.
Club and recreation sports: A club asks for age, fees and a sports physical. The playing rules US Youth Soccer publishes carry no immunization condition, and neither do Little League's published eligibility rules. A shot rule turns up when the venue does it: a school gym, a hospital, a licensed camp.
Scouting: Scouting America's annual health form asks for a tetanus shot within the last 10 years, and Scouting America publishes an immunization exemption request form for families who decline.
Summer camp: A camp accredited by the American Camp Association has to collect a health history from every camper, and the association's own guidance says a signed refusal counts as the record.
Dual enrollment: A community college course, and coursework taken online, often sits outside a state's college immunization law. North Carolina and Texas both write that exclusion into their own statutes.
Living on campus: Both of those statutes are written around the student who is on campus full time, so the moment to plan for is the first full time semester on a campus.
Enlisting: Nobody is turned away from enlistment for being unvaccinated. Recruits are immunized by the military in their first days of basic training.
Healthcare training: A nursing or allied health student can be admitted to the program and still be blocked from the clinical hours, because the clinical site, not the college, decides which exemptions it accepts.
Travel abroad: Some countries ask for proof of yellow fever vaccination on an international certificate before letting a traveler in. A doctor can write a medical waiver on that certificate, and the destination country may or may not accept it.

State Setup & Compliance

West Virginia

Your choices

Choice 1. The shot record

Choice 2. Medical exemption

Religious exemption

Good to know