NewsNation — A growing trend of vitamin K shot refusal among parents is putting newborns at risk of a dangerous, life-threatening bleeding condition.
Vitamin K is crucial for blood clotting, but babies are born with very low levels. This puts them risk of vitamin K deficiency bleeding, which can lead to complications and death in newborns.
The vitamin K shot became a routine vaccination for newborns in the 1960s. According to the National Institute of Health, this single shot administered to the thigh muscle within a day of birth “essentially eliminated cases of bleeding from vitamin K deficiency nationwide.”
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“It’s really terrifying. It’s like we’re going backwards,” Dr. Nia Heard-Garris, pediatric physician-scientist at Lurie Children’s Hospital, Chicago, said of growing refusals in a Reuters report. “We’re trying really hard to keep little babies alive.”
But almost 70 years later, there is a continued increase in the number of parents who are wary of vaccinations, opting out of the life-saving newborn preventative care.
In this photo provided by Norton Healthcare, nurse Robin Waldridge administers a Vitamin K shot to a newborn baby at Norton Women’s and Children’s Hospital on Friday, March 6, 2026, at the hospital in Louisville, Ky. (Jamie Rhodes/Norton Healthcare via AP)
From 2017 to 2019, there was only about a 1.3% increase in parents refusing. Over the past six months, that statistic has jumped by 57%, however, from 5.2% refusal in December 2025 to 8.1% in June.
In recorded cases of VKBD, researchers at the American Academy of Neurology found that for babies who developed the condition, “approximately 14% of the babies died, about 40% had long-term neurological disabilities such as cognitive impairment, seizures or motor deficits and about 63% of babies had brain bleeds.”
“There may be a growing perception among parents that vitamin K is unnecessary,” said Dr. Kristan Scott of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, who led a NIH-supported vitamin K shot research team. “Unfortunately, opting out of vitamin K for a newborn is akin to gambling with a child’s health, forgoing a straightforward and safe measure that effectively prevents severe complications.”
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