The number of kindergartners who are not fully immunized was above the state average in three of the five Vineyard towns with elementary schools last year, a fact which worries Island doctors who see the choice of parents to not immunize their child against illnesses such as mumps, measles and rubella as a threat not only to the health of that child but the school community at large.

Fueled by a federal grant aimed at countering a bioterrorist attack, scientists at a Providence, R.I., pharmaceutical company are banking on the collection of blood samples from nearly two dozen Vineyarders to help them develop a new vaccine against tularemia, the rare disease with an unexplained presence on Martha's Vineyard.