West Virginia senators voted to dismantle one of the nation’s strictest school vaccination policies Friday by greenlighting an exemption for families who say mandated inoculations conflict with their religious or philosophical beliefs.

On the eve of the vote in the West Virginia Senate scheduled today on whether to grant broad religious and philosophical exemptions for the state’s school-age mandatory immunization program, two Republican state senators from the same district – both Catholics – are on opposite sides of the issue.

A bill to create a religious exemption for school children’s vaccination requirements has passed the West Virginia Senate.

The West Virginia Senate passed a bill allowing vaccination exemptions in public schools to accommodate religious conviction or moral grounds.