Texas governor orders anti-cancer vaccine for schoolgirls

Is this so common that it needs to be mandated? What are the % of people getting it?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(BORNGEARHEAD @ Feb 5 2007, 06:50 PM) [snapback]385742[/snapback]</div>

75% (getting at least one strain of HPV virus, which has a few strains that can lead to cervical cancer)

 

At minimum we are begining to think and act prevention rather than react after infection. With regards to privacy and profit considerations, for too long our approach to medicine has been "allelopathic," that is react with drugs or invasive procedures - thinking and acting short-term. We need more long-term thinking and actions throughout our societies.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(BORNGEARHEAD @ Feb 5 2007, 02:50 PM) [snapback]385742[/snapback]</div>

There are some stats at the American Cancer Society . Great headway has been made in early detection so that "only" about 4,000 women will die this year from it. It used to be a leading cause of cancer death among women, but the early detection allows surgical, chemo or radiation therapy intervention to get much better "cure" rates.

The problem is that none of those options is pleasant. Because a very high percentage of the cervical cancers are caused by the HPV, we have the opportunity to wipe out cervical cancer nearly completely through the use of a simple vaccine.

 

the only real way to deal with viruses is to prevent them. if you miss out on the prevention phase and get a case of HPV, there's no getting rid of it. that's the logic here.

 

I don't like this mandate at all. The vaccine is fine and should be recommended.

1) women who abstain are at no risk.
2) Women who demand the use of a condom are at no risk
3) Women who have no family history of cervical problems are at a very low risk.

So essentially, we are mandating a vaccine that will be beneficial to a minority of women.
Never mind the damages some vaccines have caused in the past, or the possible link of autism with vaccinations.

How about mandating the vaccine for women the first time they get a prescription for birth controll pills?
That hits the majority of those at risk. And of course anyone can still get it anytime and those with a family history of it would get it ASAP anyways.

 

1. how many people will abstain for their whole lives? or have zero sexual contact? this happens both outside marriage and in marriage... saying "i do" does not automatically make you safe. so unless someone plans to just never have sex at all, or get all partners tested before having sex with them, this doesn't work.
2. and in trying for a family? you can't have a baby without losing the condoms. and if the man has HPV, she's gonna get it too. that just happened to a very close friend of mine, actually, she was diagnosed about 4 months into her pregnancy i think. before she and her fiancee got together, she had tested negative for STDs (ex-bf gave her reason for concern) and was proud of it.
3. this is a vaccine against HPV, not against the genetic factors surrounding cervical cancer.

about mandating with the first oc prescription, i also can't see that working. first, how many kids are going around having sex without having gotten an oc prescription first? second, how many are performing sexual acts that can transmit HPV without actually having sex?

i fail to see how this benefits a "minority" of women.

 

I'm concerned about mandating anything...on the other hand, we're not all always great at managing our own health.

What's most odd that something so obviously beneficial has to be made mandatory...or people won't avail themselves of it.

Kind of like participating in retirement plans at work...another good choice which lots of people won't take advantage of unless they're forced to.

My only fear is that there will be an unexpected reaction to the the vaccine, which will be pointed to by its detractors as a reason to avoid treatments like this in the future.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Darwood @ Feb 6 2007, 07:17 AM) [snapback]386024[/snapback]</div>

You are almost right on number 1, but not on number 2 and 3. Condoms do not prevent the spread of HPV, as it can be spread from the base of the penis or other pubic region not covered by the condom to the woman.

The problem with number 3 is that the woman may not have a family history because while there is a genetic component to who will develop cervical cancer after getting HPV, she does not know how many in her family had HPV, so she cannot be certain that the lack of cervical cancer in her family history represents a lack of risk or just a lack of exposure.

Finally, I assume by "abstain" you mean that women who do not engage in premarital sex are not exposed. Most women get married. Their husbands can be infected with HPV and not know it. They can be the truly innocent victims of the virus. I know of three cases, two personal, where the woman in a second marriage dies of cervical cancer after the man's first wife had died. Both of these women were god-fearing, Christian women, as were the carrier-husbands (who may have had either a wild past "forgiven" by their church or were victims themselves of the former wife's promiscuity). The third case is Eva Peron, who followed Peron's first wife into death by cervical cancer.

More American women die of cervical cancer each year than the war in Iraq has claimed of American servicepeople in nearly 4 years of war. So it is a real problem and one we can fix. It is immoral not to try.

 

Is it true that this vaccine has not been FDA approved?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(BORNGEARHEAD @ Feb 8 2007, 10:20 AM) [snapback]386907[/snapback]</div>

No. It is approved. http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2006/NEW01385.html

 

Some women are genetically predisposed to having cervical cancer. The HPV just triggers it. Some women are not predisposed to cervical cancer and HPV is not likely to trigger it.
The base of the penis spreads HPV? that's news to me if it is true. Assuming men shower, I don't see how HPV can be spread that way. If that's true, you could get it from a toilet too.

I'm not against the vaccine. Just mandating it. You cannot mandate everything in people's lives no matter how good the intentions are. Big money interests will always find a way to influence big brother policies to their own advantage and they will always make mistakes. This vaccine has zero long term testing and is getting fast tracked as a boon to big pharma. That throws up red flags immediately.

AND BTW...the FDA is HEAVILY influenced if not outright in the pocket of big pharma. How'd that Vioxx appoval work out?

"I fail to see how this benefits a "minority" of women."
Ummm...because a MINORITY of women get cervical cancer, not the majority. Hence, the vaccine would have helped that a % of that minority.


Let me make another example.
There is a shot that some alcoholics take that cause alcohol consumption to be ineffective/unpleasant.
Thousands of people have alcoholism in their family. Should we then mandate that everyone have this shot? Especially those dang teenage drinkers? How far do we go down this road? Should we all be walking cocktails of antibiotics, vaccines, and pharmaceuticals? Doesn't anyone see the danger in this? 100 years from now, no human born will be able to survive outside the womb without a massive cocktail of drugs. Humans need to evolve these defenses, not rely on shady chemical companies.

Again...I'm not against this and if I had a daughter, I would not fight this. I just think it's stupid to mandate it.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Darwood @ Feb 8 2007, 10:15 AM) [snapback]386917[/snapback]</div>

ummm, more than a MINORITY of women are at RISK for getting it. risk is the key factor, hence the preventive aspect of the whole thing.

with alcoholism, there are other options above and beyond slowly dying from a disease with no cure.

i agree that there's only so far that we can go. but since we have no cure for cancer... or viruses for that matter... and once you're infected or full of metastasized tumors there's no going back... why not reduce the risk of that happening in the first place?

you want humanity to evolve a set of defenses? lobby against all that nonspecific antibacterial crap they try to sell everyone.

 

The mandate is likely because the vaccine is more effective when given before sexual activity has begun.

HPV is spread through skin to skin contact so, while you won't get it in a shower, if someone had active HPV at the base of his penis, he could spread it when having sex.

HPV is estimated to infect about 10 million women in the US. Between 28% and 46% of women under the age of 25 are infected with HPV.

~11,000-15,000 women a year get cervical cancer, and ~4,000 a year die of it.

more facts at http://www.ashastd.org/learn/learn_hpv_facts.cfm

 

I am against the non specific AntiBiotics that they hand out like candy to everyone who walks through a hospital door. Not against them per say, but how frequent and quick they are to prescribe them.

"11,000-15,000 women a year get cervical cancer, and ~4,000 a year die of it."
Definately a minority I'd say. So what % of those infected with HPV get cervical cancer? We likely don't know this yet, but it's not 100, its not 50, what is it? Is the rate high enough to warrant forcing a lightly tested vaccine on everyone? HPV does NOT trigger instant cervical cancer. An unknown minority of those with HPV develop cervical cancer years later. How do we know this vaccine prevents the cancer from developing years later? There are NO long term studies, this vaccine is getting fasttracked. This isn't the black plaque here, threatening all of our society with a rapidly spreading death sentence.
What if the numbers of deaths from it were half as many? A quarter of that? How far down do you go? If a disease kills 10 people a year, do we mandate the vaccine for everyone?

Interactions between medications is a serious problem. Doctors and pharmacist do a much better job now than 10-20 years ago at preventing it. BUT, the more drugs, vaccines, AB's, we stick in people, the more common these interactions will be, and the more problematic and complicated they will be. Viruses mutate anyways and vaccines become useless or obsolete all the time. How do you then get rid of mandates for obsolete or ineffective vaccinations? It's already confusing enough having children go through these damn things.

I just think the medical community has had zero time to really study this/these kind of things, so we shouldn't jump to a mandate just because Merck...errr, the FDA says we should. We should only do this when the disease in question could spread and wipe out vast numbers of people in short order. Like smallpox back in the day.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(BORNGEARHEAD @ Feb 5 2007, 05:50 PM) [snapback]385742[/snapback]</div>

Polio, Pertussis, Diptheria, Mumps, Measles, rubella are all now very rare(thanks to vaccines). Should we just discontinue these?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(burritos @ Feb 8 2007, 02:05 PM) [snapback]387058[/snapback]</div>

Are the viruses still a major threat to spread rapidly throught the public? Than no, we should not discontinue them. If they are not a threat anymore, than yes, we should.
duh. That's a dumb analogy anyways. Those are diseases that were wiping out many more people than cervical cancer and that spreads at a fast rate throughout the public. I wouldn't elevate cervical cancer to the "plaque status" quite so fast.

Most people don't know what HPV is! But if they have a cervical cancer in their family they probably do and will now have a vaccine recomended to them. That's good! But lets not rush out and push it on everyone qute so fast. Give it to higher risk people first and observe for a while.

All I'm saying, is we the public cannot be rushed into these kind of forced vaccinations. We are setting up a situation where it is profitable for big pharma to use fear to push product. Should we have given cipro to everyone in the country after the Anthrax scare? That's what some were talking about. "Oh no..we don't have enough cipro for everyone in the country!" Despite the fact that Cipro was not even intended for Anthrax. BTW, we heard news back then of a rush to produce more Cipro to alleviate the "Pulic's concern". Once they scare was over, where did all that cipro they made go? Gee, I was prescribed Cipro 3 years ago for prostatitis. 3 pills in, I thought I was dying. Stopped the pills and I was fine. Thanks doc! At least I was covered in case of an anthrax attack!

 

Gov. Perry's political ties with drug company Merck may have influenced the decision. His ex-chief of staff, Mike Toomey, is a lobbyist for Merck and Perry received contributions from the drug manufacturer's political action committee.

Merck could generate $billions in sales if Gardasil - at $360 for the three-shot regimen - were made mandatory across the country. Got stock?

 

Ironic that something that is presumably being mandated in an attempt to save lives starts in a state with an execution policy equivalent to putting in a fast lane in death row....

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Darwood @ Feb 8 2007, 07:15 AM) [snapback]386917[/snapback]</div>

HPV causes genital warts, which can appear at the base of the penis, the testicles, etc., and spread the disease. Its why prostitutes in Nevada do a visual inspection of the customer prior to having him don the condom. From http://scc.uchicago.edu/hpv.htm:

Studies show that condoms can help prevent the spread, but condoms are not as reliable in preventing it because the infection site can be external.


<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Darwood @ Feb 8 2007, 07:15 AM) [snapback]386917[/snapback]</div>

You have obviously never worked in biotech or the pharmaceutical industry. The FDA is not in the pocket of anyone, and their inspections are routinely feared by those in even the largest companies.