Newfoundland and labrador girls to receive HPV vaccinations this fall

Prof, parents, feminists and pro-lifers raise questions about testing and long-term effects

SHALANDA PHILLIPS, THE MUSE (MEMORIAL UNIVERSITY OF NEWFOUNDLAND)

ST. JOHN’S (CUP) — Over 2,800 sixth-grade girls will be vaccinated against four strands of human papillomavirus this fall. But some researchers still think that mass inoculation with the new drug is premature.

Corrine Pomroy, whose daughter Ayla is slated to be vaccinated in 2008, says that while she wants her daughter to be protected, the government should make sure the vaccine is safe for girls’ long-term health.

“I don’t think that a small clinical trial is suitable. I want things to be observed for at least a generation before they’re approved to be injected into my kid. I don’t think our government or the U.S. government has been honest about what the side-effects are,” Pomroy said.

Pomroy isn’t alone in her concern over the government’s rush to roll out the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine.

McGill University professor Abby Lipman says that only 1,200 girls were monitored for just 18 months by pharmaceutical company Merck Ross Canada Ltd., the manufacturer of the HPV vaccine. She says this is simply not long enough to determine what risks may be associated with the drug.

But with the federal government allotting $300 million of this year’s budget for provincial HPV vaccination programs, young girls across the country will receive what has been called a cancer vaccine for women, despite the warnings.

The vaccine, Gardasil, will prevent girls from contracting four particular strands of HPV once they become sexually active. Together, HPV strains 6, 11, 16 and 18 are believed to cause 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases and 90 per cent of genital wart cases. HPV infects about half of all sexually active North American women between the ages of 18 and 22.

“This vaccine is considered one of the first and most successful steps young women can take to prevent cervical cancer and we want them to have the best advantage to avoid this terrible disease,” provincial health minister Ross Wiseman said in a press release.

But like Pomroy, many groups in the province caution that the vaccine is just too rushed, putting women’s long-term health in jeopardy.

Sabrina O’Brian, a member of the Memorial University of Newfoundland’s women’s resource centre, also thinks the vaccine is being introduced too fast.

“If they aren’t sure exactly what happens, or what’s going to happen or what the consequences are, if they don’t know for sure then they should wait before rushing in and vaccinating nearly 3,000 girls,” O’Brian said.

Others believe that Gardasil could actually precipitate an increase in sexually transmitted infections.

President Patrick Hanlon of the Right To Life Association says vaccinating girls against HPV is just a “band-aid solution that does not fix the underlying cause of why we are at such a crisis now.”

Hanlon says the HPV vaccination will only instill in young people a false sense of security about their level of protection, causing them to engage in riskier behaviour.

“Sexual education without a good element of abstinence education could actually contribute to an increase in promiscuity and STDs. Therefore there’s a bit of concern that the HPV vaccine may just contribute to a failing sex ed,” Hanlon said.

While abstaining from sex is not everyone’s first choice, everyone agrees that women’s health is of the utmost importance.

“There needs to be . . . regular Pap tests and general sexual health education for both young girls and young guys,” said O’Brian. Pap smears are the only test available to detect changes in cervical cells that could