Florida is aiming to become the first US state to cancel all of its vaccine mandates, many of which require children to get jabs against diseases like polio in order to attend public schools.

The state’s top health official, Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, likened the mandates to “slavery”, in announcing the plans.

“Who am I to tell you what your child should put in your body?” he said. “I don’t have that right. Your body is a gift from God.”

Florida officials did not give a timeline or details on ending the mandates. Several may only be repealed through a vote by the Republican-led state legislature, while others can be scrapped by the state health department.

Ladapo, though, pledged several times during Wednesday’s news conference to end “all of them, every last one of them”.

The surgeon general has been frequently criticised by doctors and health groups, who say he has spread misinformation.

Democratic state lawmaker Anna Eskamani was among those criticising the plan to end all mandates, decrying it as “reckless and dangerous”.

“This is a public health disaster in the making for the Sunshine State,” she posted on X.

While every state requires children to be vaccinated in order to attend public schools, each one has different policies about giving exemptions to the mandates.

Idaho, another Republican-dominated state, loosened many of its rules on vaccines earlier this year, but still requires children to be immunised.

In Florida, students are currently required to be vaccinated against multiple illnesses, including chicken pox, hepatitis B, measles, mumps and polio.

The Florida Education Association, a group representing more than 120,000 school teachers and administrators, also condemned the move, saying health officials are discussing “disrupting student learning and making schools less safe”.

“State leaders say they care about reducing chronic absenteeism and keeping kids in school – but reducing vaccinations does the opposite, putting our children’s health and education at risk,” the statement said.

According to the World Health Organization, vaccines have saved at least 154 million lives – mostly infants – in the past 50 years.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that about four million deaths are prevented worldwide each year by childhood vaccinations.

Dr Debra Houry, who resigned in protest last week from her post as the CDC’s chief medical officer, told the BBC that the move in Florida could lead to outbreaks of several preventable diseases among students.

She noted that about 270 children in the US died from influenza this past flu season, and about 90% of those children were unvaccinated, “so vaccines are really important to prevent kids from having these significant diseases”.

Dr Nahid Bhadelia, director of the Boston University Center on Emerging Infectious Diseases, added: “It’s particularly unfortunate for Florida because its such a big travel hub. They have people coming and going from Florida all over the world.”

Dr Bhadelia, who also advised the White House during the Covid pandemic, also told the BBC that the decision may lead to fewer insurance providers covering the cost of the immunisations, leading to increased danger for at-risk adults such as pregnant women.

On Wednesday, a group of Democratic-led states announced they had created an alliance to co-ordinate on health matters, including immunisations, in opposition to the Trump administration’s overhaul and changes to public health programmes and guidance.

The governors of Washington, Oregon and California said they would use guidance from national medical organisations, many of which have rejected the Trump administration’s changes to childhood vaccinations, and lean less on advice from the federal government.

In a joint press release they said Trump was “dismantling” the CDC, and blasted the recent decision by US Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr – a vaccine sceptic – to remove experts from the CDC’s vaccine advisory panel.