University of California schools to require measles shots

LOS ANGELES — University of California students will have to be vaccinated against measles and other diseases under new rules that take effect in 2017.

Officials who announced the changes on Friday say the plan's been in the works but it took on new urgency after a measles outbreak at Disneyland in December that's spread to a half-dozen states and Mexico.

Currently UC only requires students to be inoculated against hepatitis B, although some individual campuses have stricter immunization rules.

The new rules will add vaccination requirements for measles, tuberculosis, chicken pox, whooping cough and meningitis.

University officials say there will be exemptions for medical or religious reasons.

On Friday, California public health officials said the number of measles cases in the state has risen to 103, four more than two days earlier.