COLUMBIA, S.C. — School has started back and one of the things that parents and guardians should have checked off of their back-to-school list of things to do was to get their child or children vaccinated.

Classrooms, offices, lunchrooms -- anywhere there is a gathering of people -- can be where contagious diseases have the best opportunity to spread, sometimes causing serious outbreaks.

August is National Immunization Awareness Month and the South Carolina Dept. of Public Health (DPH) and Prisma Health want everyone to focus on the importance of vaccines and how they can help protect people of all ages from diseases, including measles.

For instance, although measles was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000, just this year there have been 1,356 confirmed cases and 32 out

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