Earlier this month it was reported that a teenager, who was adopted by her paternal grandmother at the age of three and who has lived in Florida since her adoptive mother married an American in 2000, was facing possible deportation to England for refusing a vaccination that protects against the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus virus (HPV). The 17-year-old Christian, Simone Davis insists that she has no need for the vaccine because she is not sexually active and has taken a pledge to remain a virgin until she gets married. However, the American government requires female immigrants between the ages of 11 and 26 to receive the Gardasil vaccination before they can become citizens, even though it is not required of American-born girls.

Then on Monday evening news broke here in the UK about the death of 14-year-old Natalie Morton, hours after she was given a similar vaccine to protect against cervical cancer. Although a post-mortem has shown that an 'underlying health condition' was the actual cause of death, the newspapers have since started to carry tragic reports such as that of 13-year-old Paige Brennan, who is now unable to talk or walk properly, six months since falling ill with a virus after she was immunised with the Cervarix vaccine.

Quite clearly, there are health questions to be answered about the vaccines. For one thing, although the vaccine protects against the two types of HPV which cause around 70% of cervical cancers (a total of 37 types of HPV are known to be transmitted through sexual contact), it confers no protection against types causing the remaining 30% of such cancers, so women will still need to have regular cervical smear tests. If HPV vaccination leads to reduced participation in cervical screening, it may mean that fewer early cancers are detected, paradoxically resulting in increased death rates.

More worryingly, although it is claimed the vaccine offers lifelong protection, nobody actually knows for how long this vaccine's protection will last or whether giving the vaccine to girls aged 9-14 will be effective, as all the studies showing a reduction in cancerous changes were carried out in women aged 16-24. We also do not know what effect suppressing these particular types of HPV will have on other types of the virus. In particular, the reports showing the success of the vaccine also indicated that new cancer-causing strains could consequently evolve. Further, at present most HPV infections are naturally cleared by the adult immune system and it is wholly unclear what effect the vaccination programme will have on this natural immunity.

Perhaps it would be worth channelling some of the funds involved in this taxpayer-funded campaign into abstinence education. After all, recent research in the USA has shown that states that accepted abstinence education funding saw significantly greater reductions in teen abortions compared to states that didn't: a 208% greater reduction in abortions among girls 14 years old and younger and a 294% greater reduction in abortions among girls 19 years old and younger compared with states that rejected funding for abstinence only education:

At the end of the day, whatever the costs and benefits of any HPV vaccine, we are surely reminded that what happens between consenting adults (or, indeed, under-age teenagers) is not simply a private matter but has immense social, political and economic questions for all of us. After all, at the very least, if sexual intercourse were reserved for relationships in which a public lifelong commitment has first been made, then we would not now be taking the drastic, costly, and somewhat risky measure of vaccinating the nation's young women against a small percentage of the many sexually transmitted diseases in circulation in the uncertain hope of avoiding 70% of the 950 or so deaths attributed each year in the UK to cervical cancer.

Source of graphic: Lifenews.com

• 
• Share