Virginia Second U.S. State to Require Mandatory Gardasil Vaccinations
Following the lead of Texas, Governor Timothy Kaine of Virginia says that he will sign legislation requiring all sixth grade girls to be vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV), which can cause cervical cancer. Currently twenty other U.S. State legislatures are considering similar bills.
What I have personally found shocking and disturbing is that despite so much media attention on Gardasil, HPV and cervical cancer, mandatory vaccinations are still being opposed by religious conservatives who claim that such vaccinations will encourage promiscuity in teenage girls. As Bill Maher said on Real Time on HBO last night, “just because you get a shot for typhoid doesn’t mean you go drink the sewer water in Bombay…”, this is a very similar kind of absurdity.
The whole key to vaccinating girls around the time when they’re entering the sixth grade is to protect them before they become sexually active, and around the time that they’re just entering puberty. From my understanding, the vaccine is only effective prior to becoming infected with HPV. It is simply outrageous that such religious conservatives are trying to block efforts to protect the next generation of women from a deadly disease such as cervical cancer. It strikes at the very heart of our femininity, and it’s dangerously irresponsible to confuse good medical judgment with a warped view of human sexuality.
These are the same religious christo-fascists who don’t want teens to have access to condoms, and who try and force abstinence only virginity contracts on their kids; kids who neither understand the implications of what’s being pushed on them because they’re only beginning to understand and experience their sexuality nor what it is they’re actually being saved from if anything at all.
A report released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that one in four U.S. women ages 14 to 59 is infected with HPV, which kills 10 women a day nationwide. Gardasil, and other competing vaccines in the pipeline similar to Gardasil can virtually eliminate cervical cancer as we know it in one generation if mandatory vaccination programs are enacted nationwide.
My chief objection to mandatory vaccination was the cost of using public tax dollars to enrich Merck Inc., but after careful thought, I now have to endorse mandatory vaccinations as a matter of conscience. No woman should have to suffer the scourge of cervical cancer ever again, especially since we now have a way to prevent the infections responsible for 70% of all cervical cancer cases worldwide, and I would challenge any opponent to such measures to provide a compelling argument as to why this shouldn’t be done on a national scale. We owe it to every woman to try and spread the word about Gardasil and to vaccinate every girl that we’re able.
1Carol
wrote on 3 March 2007 at 21:11
For many years, conservatives have been saying that condoms are not safe sex, there is no safe sex (except abstinence) because of HPV. Something that has been a scare tactic… isn’t any more. Why not teach their children responsibility and meanwhile protect thier health? I’m not sure I agree with mandatory - as someone who has had unusual reactions to medications, I think people should be able to opt out. Can HPV be spread by casual contact (coughing etc.) as other childhood diseases?
Anyway, I’ve been enjoying your blog for the past week. You are a fabulous writer, Nina, no matter what topic!
2nina
wrote on 3 March 2007 at 22:54
Hi Carol,
Thanks so much for the kind words, and welcome to lazy geisha! I’m so glad that you’ve enjoyed my space!
Okay, now to Gardasil. I agree, that there should be an opt out plan (which in both Texas and the proposed law in Virginia there are provisions to opt out), but in my view, the opt out should be for medical reasons only. While I respect parent rights being a parent myself, I cannot in good conscience support not vaccinating a young girl based on religious beliefs. While I know this may enrage the libertarians and social conservatives, that’s just the way I see it.
HPV is a sexually transmitted disease, so the form which causes cervical cancer can only be spread thru unprotected sexual contact. I have long been an advocate for comprehensive sex education for all teens including a militant policy on condom use. Condoms save lives, there’s just no way around that!
The religious right has used all kinds of things as scare tactics to try and surpress basic and normal sexual urges in teens. I think honest dialog and education goes a lot further than scare tactics.
Abstinence is fine, and I think people should wait until they’re emotionally ready to accept the consequences of a sexual relationship, but to act as if sex is somehow bad or dirty or against God is simply absurd, and I think we do our children a disservice as parents by not educating them.
Funny that teen pregnancy rates have gone up under Bush’s faith based abstinence only plans. Why? Because they don’t work!
Anyway, thanks for sharing your thoughts with me, and again, welcome!
xoxo,
nina
3Rhoda IV
wrote on 4 March 2007 at 4:12
Dearest Nina,
A family member of mine was diagnosed with HPV about 7 years ago and I was the only one that wasn’t a medical professional that she knew that could tell her exactly what it was.
Now it’s finally become common knowledge, and if it’s just because some company has finally discovered a vaccine that doesn’t matter to me. I’m just glad people are finally aware of HPV and that it can finally be prevented!
Cancer runs rampant in my family, my gran Petie has had cancer four times now. She is still ashamed of having only one breast even though she had her masectomy over 20 years ago. When we take her out on the town when she gets out here she sometimes doesn’t want to wear her very uncomfortable and unneeded fake breast and she always asks you won’t be embarassed will you? I always tell her that I’m proud of my amazon grandmother, that she is a survivor of the highest order and a hero to me. Then I tell her if anyone dared say anything untoward about it I’d throw down no matter what. That’s when she gives me the best hug EVER!
Too many female cancers have been in the dark for far too long. It’s good to see that all this cancer research thats been going on is getting real results! Someday we will have a cure all cancers, but for now I’ll settle for a small step foward that gives me hope for the future.
4nina
wrote on 5 March 2007 at 2:12
Darling Rhoda,
I agree that the best thing that’s come of all of the talk and attention to Gardasil has been that we’ve raised the awareness of HPV as a serious health concern for women. HPV and Gardasil are now close to being household words and they absolutely should be too. I’ve nagged a bunch of my girlfriends to have this conversation with their own ob/gyns’ about getting tested and vaccinated for HPV, and also too, I’ve been preaching about condom use for like, forever, because this stuff is just so important.
One news story I saw about Gardasil talked about how in a period where big pharmaceutical companies aren’t investing in new vaccine research that it was huge that a company like Merck would spend so much to develop something like Gardasil. It does remind me that drug companies are evil and I wonder just how many other disease could be cured if they actually tried to do that instead of coming up with some pill to keep an 80 year old’s dick hard, you know? So, I don’t discount the profit motive on the part of Merck, especially after what they went thru with Vioxx, but I’m grateful that something like HPV and cervical cancer are being taken serious. Think about this, we could eradicate cervical cancer as we know it in a single generation if we vaccinate even 40% of all girls in the target age group. That’s amazing! While cervical cancer may not be the leading killer of women, even losing one woman’s life to this disease is one too many, not to mention the women who have to endure hysterectomy or go thru chemotherapy to try and beat the disease. I mean, how awful it must be for a young woman to become sterile because she had to have her sex organs removed because of cervical cancer? While I know that some people might not agree with me, I believe that part of our natural cycle of life is to bear children. I think we’re hardwired with that, and for a woman to lose that part of her life to a disease that now can be stopped is just wrong, wrong, wrong! Which is why it totally blows my mind that these religious nuts don’t want to vaccinate their daughters! What’s wrong with these people?
Your grandmother is a brave woman to have fought and beat cancer four times, and I can so empathize with how she must feel after having a mastectomy. I mean, these are things which only we can understand because they directly impact how we see ourselves. I wish more of us were in key positions on the boards of directors of drug companies and also in government so we could impact the decision making process. These are things which only affect our lives that are continuously being pushed aside for things like, yeah, the pill that can keep an 80 year old’s dick hard. It’s stupid and wrong.
You are so right that too many female cancers have been in the dark for far too long. Gardasil may not be perfect, mandatory vaccination may not be perfect, but it’s a start, and if anything, it’s got us talking about this which is so important, and maybe my efforts in talking about Gardasil and HPV and writing about these topics will influence or motivate even just one of us to talk to her doctor and get vaccinated.
Thank you so much for sharing this with me and for adding your voice to this topic sweetie,
love,
nina
:kissing:
5awylf
wrote on 26 March 2007 at 18:08
I would like to add one comment about HPV, most studies show that condoms are only 70% effective against it. Because it lives in the skin, not in fluids it can still be spread even with consistant condom usage.
6nina
wrote on 27 March 2007 at 11:19
awylf,
Thanks for sharing that. Condoms while being very effective, are not fool proof. Thanks for the extra info.
xoxo,
nina