Hawaiʻi health officials are trying a new tactic to convince families to vaccinate their children against measles amid what they say is the growing risk of an outbreak.

The health department plans to issue an emergency rule allowing children with religious exemptions to receive the vaccination protecting against measles while remaining exempt from all other vaccines. The rule would be in effect for 120 days.

Hawaiʻi measles vaccination rate is currently 90%, well below the 95% threshold needed to prevent an outbreak, the Department of Health said in a press release on Thursday.

Texas, which has recorded more than 400 cases since the start of the year, has a measles vaccination rate of 93%.

“Measles is a very serious, sometimes fatal disease for children,” State Epidemiologist Sarah Kemble said in the written release. “At the rate it’s spreading, it could easily reach Hawaiʻi on the next plane.”

Last year, 4% of students in Hawaiʻi public and private schools had religious exemptions. Over the past decade, the state has seen a roughly 250% increase in the number of students with religious exemptions from vaccines.

This session, lawmakers considered a bill that would have ended the religious exemption for Hawaiʻi students, but the proposal died in the House last month.

The health department is also trying to coordinate with schools to host on-site vaccination clinics.

Civil Beat’s education reporting is supported by a grant from Chamberlin Family Philanthropy and its community health coverage is supported by the Cooke Foundation, Atherton Family Foundation and Papa Ola Lokahi.