Posted on 02/02/2007 1:28:44 PM PST by YCTHouston
AUSTIN — Gov. Rick Perry ordered today that schoolgirls in Texas must be vaccinated against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer, making Texas the first state to require the shots.
The girls will have to get Merck & Co.'s new vaccine against strains of the human papillomavirus, or HPV, that are responsible for most cases of cervical cancer.
Merck is bankrolling efforts to pass laws in state legislatures across the country mandating it Gardasil vaccine for girls as young as 11 or 12. It doubled its lobbying budget in Texas and has funneled money through Women in Government, an advocacy group made up of female state legislators around the country.
Details of the order were not immediately available, but the governor's office confirmed to The Associated Press that he was signing the order and he would comment Friday afternoon.
Perry has several ties to Merck and Women in Government. One of the drug company's three lobbyists in Texas is Mike Toomey, his former chief of staff. His current chief of staff's mother-in-law, Texas Republican state Rep. Dianne White Delisi, is a state director for Women in Government.
Toomey was expected to be able to woo conservative legislators concerned about the requirement stepping on parent's rights and about signaling tacit approval of sexual activity to young girls. Delisi, as head of the House public health committee, which likely would have considered legislation filed by a Democratic member, also would have helped ease conservative opposition.
Perry also received $6,000 from Merck's political action committee during his re-election campaign.
It wasn't immediately clear how long the order would last and whether the legislation was still necessary. However it could have been difficult to muster support from lawmakers who champion abstinence education and parents' rights.
Perry, a conservative Christian who opposes abortion rights and stem-cell research using embryonic cells, counts on the religious right for his political base.
But he has said the cervical cancer vaccine is no different than the one that protects children against polio.
"If there are diseases in our society that are going to cost us large amounts of money, it just makes good economic sense, not to mention the health and well being of these individuals to have those vaccines available," he said.
Texas allows parents to opt out of inoculations by filing an affidavit stating that he or she objected to the vaccine for religious or philosophical reasons.
Even with such provisions, however, conservative groups say mandates take away parents' rights to be the primary medical decision maker for their children.
The federal government approved Gardasil in June, and a government advisory panel has recommended that all girls get the shots at 11 and 12, before they are likely to be sexually active.
The New Jersey-based drug company 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.
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. Susan Crosby, the group's president, also declined to specify how much the drug company gave.
A top 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.
Please explain how cancer is prevented by this vaccine?
I was going to respond to you until I read that last sentence.
Bold words from somebody who accuses everybody who objects to this nanny state scheme of supporting cervical cancer.
and then you attack your perception of it as faulty.
The only faulty perception is yours. You've been harping on the "anti-cancer vaccine" theme since you arrived here.
I simply pointed out that your characterization of the GENITAL WARTS VACCINE was medically incorrect. Now you're pissed that you got smacked down, and your word game agenda got exposed. So you do what any good liberal does and blame your untenable position on me.
It apparently kills the virus that is the leading cause of this cancer. I can't tell you how the virus causes the cancer, but it's not apparently controversial.
No one has tried that angle yet on this thread.
No, it's about MANDATING it by executive order instead of the proper legislative process. It's about losing our freedoms as the nanny state takes over ala *Brave New World*, which you apparently think is just fine. Not everyone agrees with you, that just because some people think they know better than the rest, that gives them the right to make their personal decisions for the great, ignorant, unwashed masses.
You are accusing people of being for cancer and against vaccines and being deliberately obtuse. That's not what people are objecting to and they have told you that many times but you're not listening.
So listen... I do not want you making my health, lifestyle, or educational decisions for me and I do not want some governmental individual or entity doing it either.
Any wonder why the GOP did so poorly last election?
You haven't smacked anyone down.
Does the vaccine stop the the virus causing the cancer?
It might stop the warts, too, but that's a plus.
Call me a liberal one more time, and you'll wish you hadn't.
"Call me a liberal one more time,"
Take a liberal, big-government nanny-state position, get called a liberal. That's an example of logical consistency for you.
Correct. So the correct reference to the vaccine would be the "anti-(insert virus name here)" vaccine. However, since the virus is known to be transmitted via sexual contact that wouldn't sell it as well as saying it is "anti-cancer". As others have pointed out on this thread it is possible to have the virus and NOT have the cancer. And it is also known that the virus is contracted not through the air, or coughing, or sneezing, but by sexual activity (not limited to sexual intercourse). By calling the vaccine what it is the governor knows the public would not go for it. In fact, he already knows they would not go for it or he wouldn't have made a mandate via EO.
I don't know why you're incapable of understanding that something you can decline is not MANDATED.
And if you believe the governor, under existing state law, can't do this, show why it's improper.
I have yet to see where he's done anything other than what he's empowered to do. Show me some proof. Anything.
Your stats are backwards. Going by what is claimed, 30% of all women will contract HPV. This vaccine reportedly prevents 85% of HPV cases, meaning it will prevent 25.5% out of the 30% from getting genital warts. By comparison, somewhere around a couple tenths of 1% out of that 30% get cervical cancer from it. So tell me what the larger number is:
A couple tenths of a single percent? Or 25.5%?
Call me a liberal one more time, and you'll wish you hadn't.
Then quit using liberal arguments straight out of the anti-abstinence condom worshipping HIV crowd's playbook, liberal.
Yeah, the Anti-Genital Warts Act of 2007 probably wouldn't look as pretty on Mr. Pro-Life Conservative Governor's resume.
You gotta love how he did this late on a Friday afternoon don't you? Wonder why he didn't do it first thing on a Monday morning? - theoretical question of course.
Where, in the Texas Constitution, does Perry derive this authority from.?
Then I guess he shouldn't EO authority. I mean, why else would he use it when he could just punt everything to our legislature?
I was thinking something similar.
This IS NOT a public health issue. If the good governor is so concerned, why not mandate everyone get a flu shot (kills many more than HPV and costs a lot more in health care also).
Anyone who says "It is for the health of the young girls", needs to think just a few minutes.
In case you missed this one.
Why doesn't he just EO everything then?
I understand you want to protect her, and certainly there is a lot of nastiness out there; but, do we fully understand the ramifications of all the innoculations we impose on ourselves and children today?
I worry that the vaccines themselves, and kids are getting something like 30plus of them, may have unforeseen consequences.
V's wife
*It apparently kills viruses???
Anti-virals kill viruses. Vaccines stimulate a immune response that is supposed to cause the body to attack and kill the virus. Vaccines are only effective in 80% of the people they're used on with varying degrees of effectiveness. The other 20% aren't immune. The vaccine itself doesn't kill the virus. You don't even know what you're talking about.
As far as how the cancer develops, it's very likely that it's the same way other cancers do; from damaged cells that are more susceptible to changes that lead to cancer and some kind of immune deficiency that doesn't stop them.
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