Hawaii Court Rejects Student's Religious Objections To TB Test

In Hilo, Hawaii, a state judge has refused to extend a restraining order she previously issued ordering the Department of Education to admit 14-year old Alena Horowitz to high school. Saturday’s Honolulu Star Bulletin reports the student objects on religious grounds to taking a required tuberculosis test, saying that she has religious objections to permitting foreign substances to enter her blood. The court ruled that the claim had already been rejected in a prior federal court suit and that there would be no irreparable harm in denying an extension of the order since Alena could be home-schooled, as she had been previously. According to Saturday’s Honolulu Advertiser, Hawaii law allows religious exceptions from required immunizations, but state officials say the law does not cover TB testing.