NEW YORK — In the days leading up to Passover, ultra-Orthodox Jewish families maneuvered strollers through kosher markets in Brooklyn’s Borough Park neighborhood to prepare for the holiday by buying unleavened bread and wine for the Seder.
New York City officials also had Passover on their minds. A wave of measles cases has been traced to unvaccinated ultra-Orthodox children, who usually live in insular communities. When extended families get together during Passover, which begins on Friday night, the chance for the disease to spread increases. And during the holiday, many families that usually keep the modern world at a distance go on public excursions.
“People will be out and about in spaces where they interact from people from the outside world,” said Meyer Labin, a writer for the Jewish publication JP News, who works down the street from the markets in Borough Park. “We’re fearful it’s going to spread.”
For ultra-Orthodox Jews, Passover is an eight-day holiday book-ended by festival days during which they do not use electricity or drive cars.
Those restrictions lift during Chol Hamoed, the four days in between, making it a popular time for families to visit parks and museums.
Only a small subset of Orthodox Jews avoid vaccinating their children. Most sects of Orthodoxy — a denomination which itself includes only 10% of American Jews — strongly endorse vaccination to protect public health. In many Orthodox synagogues, including Washington’s Kesher Israel and Ohev Shalom, the recent measles outbreak has prompted new policies even barring those who are unvaccinated from visiting synagogues.
Jonathan Leener, an Orthodox rabbi, said many members of his community who live in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Williamsburg, where 228 measles cases have been confirmed, are embarrassed by the attention drawn to the smaller ultra-Orthodox communities, which are generally stricter in their dress and observance.
“People are asking, ‘Is this a Jewish thing? Are the rabbis saying this?’ ” he said. “It’s the opposite. Jewish law is about protecting life.”
Measles vaccinations work due to “herd immunity,” when a very high percentage of people in a given area are vaccinated, thereby protecting the community as a whole.
Babies who haven’t had their vaccines yet and children and others who can’t get vaccinated for medical reasons would otherwise be at greater risk.
Mayor Bill de Blasio raised the concern about Passover during a news conference this month, and Herminia Palacio, the deputy mayor for Health and Human Services, said there was an increase in measles cases in the city after the recent Jewish holiday of Purim.
The debate among rabbis isn’t about whether to vaccinate or not — most rabbis and leaders here encourage families to vaccinate their children.
However, there is disagreement among some ultra-Orthodox Jews, including parents, over issues like the government’s authority in mandating vaccinations and whether Orthodox schools should ban unvaccinated students.
“This is a crisis,” Labin said. “We created an illusion that we’re secluded from the outside world, but we’re physically connected to the world. This creates a shift in an understanding that we’re part of a fabric, that we can’t not interact with people around us.”
Many in the ultra-Orthodox community see popular American culture, including television and the internet, as corrupting, so some are less likely to listen to outside doctors and scientists on the matter, said Samuel Heilman, a sociologist who studies the Jewish community at Queens College of the City University of New York.
“The rabbis have a lot of control,” he said. “If they wanted to, they could exert more control on the issue. They’re caught between a rock and a hard place because they don’t want to say they’re telling the truth on vaccines but not reliable in other respects.”
New York city has mandated vaccinations in four Zip codes in Brooklyn, which has upset many in the community. In those four Zip codes, about 14% of children in schools are unvaccinated, the city said this week.
At a popular kosher ice cream shop here, one mother said the government shouldn’t have that level of control over people’s lives.
“I don’t think the government should be able to tell people what to do like that,” she said. Scattering sprinkles over ice cream while sitting in booth with padded orange seats, she said the measles are like the chickenpox, that the disease isn’t dangerous.