Lawrence Memorial Hospital announced Friday that it would not allow its health care workers to be vaccinated for smallpox.

In making the decision, hospital officials cited concerns that have been raised across the country in response to the vaccination plan initiated by President Bush as part of the war on terrorism.

“At this time, the risk versus benefit analysis weighed in favor of nonvaccinating,” said Janet Wehrle, a registered nurse and infection control practitioner.

Wehrle said there were concerns that vaccinated workers could transmit the disease to patients.

“A lot of hospitals have decided to slow down the process and see how it goes,” she said.

Sharon Watson, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said hospitals across the state were wrestling with the same questions.

Other questions raised included who would be liable in cases where vaccinated people suffered serious side effects. And some hospital officials have said that because they were short-staffed, they couldn’t handle having some employees absent for a few days if they became sick in reaction to the vaccine.

“There are a lot of issues for hospitals to consider,” Watson said.

The first round of 3,000 doses of the vaccine arrived in Kansas and will be available to health care workers in 46 hospitals. Watson said hospitals had until Monday to declare whether they would participate in the voluntary program.

Watson said the number of hospitals that had decided to participate had fluctuated greatly in the past couple of weeks, and she did not have an estimate of how many would not participate. KU Med in Kansas City, Kan., had decided earlier not to participate.

So far in Kansas, 11 KDHE employees have been vaccinated, and there have been no reported side effects, Watson said.

Smallpox was eradicated in the 1970s. Bush has cited the risk that it would be reintroduced through bioterrorism, but federal officials have not indicated a specific threat.

Bush has called for the eventual vaccination of 10.5 million health care and emergency workers for smallpox. The first vaccinations of Kansas hospital workers will start later this month.