Posted on 01/31/2007 4:01:47 AM PST by XR7
A bill concerning the mandatory vaccination of US middle-aged schoolgirls against cervical cancer is considered controversial and some states even try to pull it back.
The vaccine is only produced by Merck Sharp & Dohme (Merck & Co) and is called Gardasil. This is the world’s first vaccine against cervical cancer and other diseases caused by certain types of the human papillomavirus (HPV).
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Gardasil for mass-prescription on June 8, 2006, after a lot of clinical tests. The tests also indicated that Gardasil’s administratin to girls should occur before they become sexually active.
According to statistics, 270,000 women died of cervical cancer worldwide in 2002, making this form of cancer one of the deadliest. In the US, cervical cancer killed around 3,700 women in 2002.
Some states (through their Senate representatives) are not convinced yet of the efficacy of the vaccine. Sen. Delores G. Kelley, a Baltimore County Democrat, said yesterday that she plans to pull a bill she herself sponsored that calls for all sixth-grade girls to be vaccinated by September 2008. She voiced the concern of some parents and educators that addressed her, after chickenpox and hepatitis B vaccinations failed to immunize students from grades six to nine.
The success of the vaccine in clinical tests and FDA’s approval has determined more than a dozen states to consider introducing the mandatory vaccination with Gardasil. Some medical experts and watchdog groups have questioned though Merck’s active lobbying, although the company’s involvement is not a surprise, since it is for the moment the only producer of the substance. The groups and the medical experts also imply that state mandates are premature.
Sen. Kelley said she was not aware of "those external politics."
"The timing is just not right," she said, adding that she will likely introduce the bill again next year. "I decided to do this at a time when things have settled down and we can approach this in a more deliberative manner."
Gardasil is given in 3 injections over 6 months, namely at enrollment, and 2 and 6 months later. Gardasil protects against four subtypes that together account for 70 per cent of all cervical cancers and 90 per cent of genital warts. It has been shown to be more than 95-per-cent effective.
Some conservatives and parental-rights groups say such a requirement would encourage premarital sex and interfere with the way they raise their children. Some fear the HPV vaccine’s protection would boost young girls’ appetite for an early sexual life.
For other critics, it is the notion that their youthful innocence could be violated, during the course of three shots over six months, by a medical practitioner's potential sex-education lecture.
But Merck said its lobbying efforts have been aboveboard.
Merck has funneled money through Women in Government, an advocacy group of female state legislators.
An official from Merck’s vaccine division sits on Women in Government's business council, and many of the bills around the country have been introduced by members of Women in Government.
"Cervical cancer is of particular interest to our members because it represents the first opportunity that we have to actually eliminate a cancer," said Susan Crosby, president of Women in Government.
Merck spokeswoman Janet Skidmore would not say how much the company is spending on lobbyists or how much it has donated to Women in Government. Crosby also declined to specify how much the drug company gave.
But Skidmore said: "We disclosed the fact that we provide funding to this organization. We're not in any way trying to obscure that."
The New Jersey drug company, which is building a vaccine plant in Durham, could generate billions in sales if Gardasil -- at $360 for the three-shot regimen -- were made mandatory across the country. Most insurance companies now cover the vaccine, which has been shown to have no serious side effects.
The National Advisory Committee on Immunization says girls and women aged 14 to 26 should also be vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) even if they are already sexually active, because they may not yet have been infected.
Rep. Debbie Clary, a Cleveland County Republican, has no doubt that a North Carolina legislator eventually will introduce a bill requiring HPV vaccination. "I don't know if it will be this year or the next, but I'm certain it will be discussed," she said. "It's obvious that Merck is pushing for mandates."
"I think it will be a tremendous debate, because you're treading on territory that is a parent's decision," Clary said.
On June 29, Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommended that Gardasil be placed on the childhood immunization schedule at the 11 to 12 year old visit. They also recommended that the vaccine be included in the federal Vaccines for Children Program, which would provide the vaccines free of charge to children under the age of 18 who are uninsured. Merck & Co., Inc. is a global research-driven pharmaceutical company. Established in 1891, Merck discovers, develops, manufactures and markets vaccines and medicines to address unmet medical needs.
I wouldn't go so far as to call it child abuse but I agree with you in that I'd have this vaccine given to my child in a heartbeat.
My son is 30 and has been in two long term relationships (5 years or more) since he started dating at the age of seventeen. I wouldn't call him promiscuous. If the vaccine were to be proven effective in men his age, I'd urge him to take advantage of it.
ping.
More correctly, this STD left untreated, can (not always) cancer. If these girls were checked regularly, it could be discovered and treated before it develops into cancer, which takes years of untreated infection to do.
Meanwhile, the little disease carrier is a host, spreading the disease by either being used as a sperm depoitory, or sharing her dildo with her friends; after all, they teach "sex is fun and gay sex is fun too" in schools now.
If this prevented dick cancer, it would have been mandatory yesterday.
Again, this disease does NOT affect men. They don't have a cervix.
Or cause even more. Regardless, if you want to innoculate your kid, do so, it's your gamble. But no way will I allow you to force my kid to be. And no way will I pay for yours.
Sounds like the criminal activity of a totalitarian state.
Mandatory medication needs to be outlawed!!!
Uncircumcised men have a foreskin that that is susceptible to infection with HPV.
Uncircumcised men have a foreskin that that is susceptible to infection with HPV.
Sounds like the criminal activity of a totalitarian state.
Mandatory medication needs to be outlawed!!!
LOL
If the government says you will, you will.
ping.
"I think the vaccine should be given to boys and men. They're at least half the transmission vectors for HPV, and fair is fair."
Careful, your common sense is showing.
Yes boosters would do it, but why push to have 7 and 8 year old girls vaccinated?
Actually, I missed a better drug example. Look at the wonder drugs for depression, don't all of them come with a new warning that they have a different effect on teenagers? Cures grown men but makes children suicidal, IIRC. Now perhaps the drug companies are simply vaccinating themselves against trial lawyers but the key point is the age effect. Suing Merck into oblivion will be little solace if we cause irreparable harm to a generation of girls.
A shot will have NO EFFECT on the survival of a virus carried TOPICALLY.
Wash.
Maybe women should be circumsized too, the folds of the labia can do the same thing, therefore even if they get the shot, they can still spread the disease topically.
You got me there....
Cervical cancer deaths have dropped by around 80% in the US due to mass Pap smear screening. Prior to the 50's it was the second leading cause of cancer death among American women, topped only by breast cancer.
They only spread it topically, by contact. They don't have a warm moist orface where the disease can multiply and reproduce.
The male represents the q-tip dipped in the breeding chamber, then transfering the virus to another breeding chamber. It's done TOPICALLY, ie on the outside of the penis.
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