But after the bill passed the Assembly, an amendment was added excluding private schools, and critics argued that would have allowed only the affluent to have a choice in vaccination. The bill was torpedoed after a vigorous campaign by angry parents, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish group and anti-vaccine celebrities rallied to outmatch those pushing the bill.  Social media allowed opponents to reach directly into lawmakers' private lives and some politicians' family members were even contacted by phone. Del Bigtree, producer of "Vaxxed: From Cover-Up to Catastrophe," and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared at a rally in the state capital.

New York, California, Mississippi and West Virginia, have ended religious and philosophical exemptions to vaccination, and there is legislation pending to do so in Connecticut and Massachusetts. Maine lawmakers also approved ending most non-medical exemptions last year, but, under heavy pressure from groups opposed to mandatory vaccines, will ask voters to decide the fate of the policy in a March ballot referendum.