Would cancer vaccine lead to free love?

The trade-off between cancer and eliminating ONE potentially-dissuading risk of having sex does seem to weigh heavily in favor of parents seeing to it that their daughters are vaccinated. That having been said, it is still a hard issue for parents and harder one on which to make public policy.

To parents who have a good relationship with their daughter and know her well enough to trust that she is not at risk at such a young age, I can understand how it would feel heavy-handed for the State to mandate the vaccine.

My biggest problem with mandating the vaccine, however, is one that has been raised by many on the right, the left and in the center. The vaccine may be too new for the public to be confident in its safety in efficacy. (E.g.: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070326/houppert
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=54713 )


If there is widespread founded controversy about a vaccine's safety or effectiveness, the government should not mandate it. At the most, the State should recommend and educate parents and let them make an informed choice.

~~Baba ( http://occupationdad.blogspot.com )

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Remember that "mandatory" is kind of a misnomer. All states allow parents to opt out.

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According to a recent news article, "Just 3.4 percent of the women studied had infections with one of the four HPV strains that the new vaccine protects against." In addition, the vaccine does not protect against some of the strains that cause cervical cancer.

From another site: "Cervical Cancer is listed as a "rare disease" by the Office of Rare Diseases (ORD) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This means that Cervical Cancer, or a subtype of Cervical Cancer, affects less than 200,000 people in the US population." The same site states that the "incidence rate" is "approx 1 in 20,923 or 0.00% or 13,000 people in USA."

Again, when you consider that routine pap tests can generally catch the cases that do occur, and nobody is saying we should stop getting routine pap tests, I see this vaccine as superfluous. Just a way for the drug companies to make a ton of money.

Really, if it were true that this vaccine was going to save a lot of children's lives, would parents have to be forced to vaccinate their children?

I'm pretty sure more lives would be saved by having the government mandate a daily serving of broccoli, carrots, oranges, and apples.

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More lives might be saved by having adequate nutrition, but how likely is it that something like that is going to happen?

This vaccine, on the other hand, is a one-shot deal (or 3 shots, but you know what I mean). What about the disease process itself? I'm sure that everyone isn't bounding for joy at the knowledge of having HPV, especially when they get genital warts, among other symtpoms.

I see it more that this is a real disease that we can start to eradicate in the world. How Small Pox was declared eradicated in 1979 and polio in the Americas in 1994.

Just as sidenote, SKL, most cervical cancer cases occur in older women past their childbearing years, simply because women stop going to get pap smears done because they feel that they have no reason to go the ob/gyn clinic anymore, which can make some of this a bit obsolete.

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As an young adult female (18), I believe that this issue falls into the laps of the young women, if they are abstain, then there is no need for the vaccine, but if they choose to become sexually active, like many teen age girls, it should be vital the are aware of the vaccine and the risks associated with HPV. Although, I have choosen to forgo the vaccine myself due to it's novice status, in the present once we find out more about the vaccine and it becomes more widely accessible at a lower cost (some clinics charge up to $800 for the vaccine due to it's sole manufacture)this may become a helpful and impotant part of a womans health.

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Merck needs this this mandated to pay for all the Vioxx lawsuits.

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SKL, I'd like to know where you're getting that data, because it certainly doesn't jibe with the Journal of American Medicine findings--1 in 4 sexually active young women is certainly higher than 3.4%. Another study--of a small sample group, but still found to be significant enough to report, found that 4/5 girls were infected with the cancer causing strains of hpv.

Not to mention the fact that, for the 1000s of women who are ravaged by cervical cancer--Cancerbaby springs immediately to mind--dismissing their pain as statistically insignificant is rather offensive. Since we really cant determine for certain who will develop cancer and who won't, isn't it better to simply go on the prospect that even one life saved is worth it? Or is life really just not that important to you?

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Kimberly, there are many strains of HPV but (a) only four are addressed by this vaccine and (b) only two of those four are significantly related to cervical cancer; and (c) there are other strains associated with cancer that are not addressed by this vaccine. That explains the difference between the statistics - they are all correct, but not equally relevant.

I have known for years that cervical cancer itself is a rare disease and almost nonexistent in women who did not have sex early and often. That is why I have only had one pap test and that was only because I was required to. Frankly, women who are virgins should not have to have pap smears at all; shame on the medical community for using so many resources on something completely irrelevant as well as uncomfortable. Frankly, I'm not convinced all that jabbing doesn't increase the chance of cervical cancer.

For those who believe they have a measurable chance of getting cervical cancer, either because of family history or a history of other cancers or their behavioral history, or just don't want to take any avoidable risk however minimal, the annual pap smears that most women get, if done correctly, should protect them much better than the vaccine, because pap smears detect a higher percentage of the cancers at a very early stage. If older women are stopping pap smears, introducing the vaccine in young girls is not going to solve that problem. People who feel strongly about it should be focusing their resources on educating older women about the importance of continuing pap smears.

The fact is that people are trying to mandate a vaccine that only partially protects against a very rare disease for which there are other protections available. I don't know how people got the idea that this is a life or death matter for all the girls in the sixth grade. And it's not a win-win solution; it is costly, inconvenient, has known and unknown side effects, and calls into question the message of abstinence that most of us want to convey to our daughters.

By comparison, nobody is suggesting mandating measures that are proven to reduce the incidence of much more common and deadly diseases at a lower cost. Like lung and colon cancer - much more common and deadly - there are clear, inexpensive (even cost-saving) ways to reduce the incidence and severity of these cancers, yet where is the government mandate to take these measures? Well, obviously there won't be, because there is no drug company that stands to gain billions of dollars by lobbying for such changes.

However, if you all want to get your daughters the vaccine, go for it. I don't think my tax dollars or insurance premiums should pay for it. And I don't think I should be forced to either vaccinate my daughter nor explain to her / her school why I have decided to treat her differently than other girls are treated.

As a final note, I'd like to know why they are not requiring boys to be vaccinated. Does the vaccine work on boys? If so, vaccinating both girls and boys for a generation or two could wipe out HPV all together, eliminating any arguable need for a vaccine in the future. So why isn't that the proposal?

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Miss says that women who get HPV are sluts, what about the women who meet a new guy, date him, have sex with him and he gives them HPV without them even knowing. I know many girls who are not sluts and they ended up with HPV. Its a huge problem and i'm glad they have a vaccine, without it we are just unknowingly spreading it around.

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hi-d: Condoms?? No condom = slut.

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SKL I just want to give you a round of applause! You've said everything I wanted to say. Kudos to the parents who are refusing to inject one more poison into their childrens bodies!

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Missy, it is possible to get HPV when using a condom. No one is safe from this virus.

I don't understand the people that worry about their daughters going out and having sex because they have been vaccinated. They don't even have to tell their daughters that the vaccine has anything to do with sex. "It prevents cancer" is all they have to say.

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Someone suggested we simply tell our daughters "it prevents cancer."

But I think that could encourage risky behavior such as smoking.

Besides, it's not an accurate statement even for cervical cancer, since nearly half of cases have causes that are not prevented by the vaccine. My first thought was that after the vaccine, women could skip pap tests for the rest of their lives (yeah!). Other young women might think the same thing if given misleading information about the HPV vaccine.

I can't wait until we have a vaccine that prevents all kinds of cancers and STDs, particularly those that are most common, most difficult to detect, and most difficult to cure. But until then, we need to encourage healthy behaviors first and foremost.

For those who are thinking of getting this vaccine for their young daughters, I would suggest simply stating that it prevents some types of pappilovirus. Chances are they will not ask a followup question, but if they do, I would state that pappilovirus is a virus that can cause some types of cancer and warts, but it doesn't protect against the main deadly cancers such as lung cancer, colon cancer, and breast cancer. If they want to know still more, I'd tell that it's focused on cancers that can develop on the cervix, which is an inside part of a girls body. I don't think they need to know it's an STD.

However, if this vaccine is administered to them en masse at school, chances are they will hear it has to do with an STD. That's what will make the discussion complicated, especially with an older girl. I guess you could always say it's to protect them in case their husband has HPV (though that's kind of a difficult conversation to have with a nine-year-old). But then why are we vaccinating them when they are as young as nine years old, and why are we not vaccinating boys?

Personally, I won't have this problem, because I won't be having my daughters vaccinated, unless the vaccine is combined (at no extra cost) with other vaccines that I choose for them to have.

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