HPV Vaccine Comes with Baggage

On Thursday, the FDA approved Merck's human papillomavirus vaccine, which could save thousands of women's lives because some forms of HPV cause cervical cancer.

In an MSNBC column on Friday, Art Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania, explains why this breakthrough is more complicated than a vaccine for polio or bird flu. He also makes an excellent point about why no argument against girls getting the vaccine makes any sense:

One unknown is how long the new vaccine will protect against the nasty strains of HPV. The best estimate is five years. This means the best time to vaccinate is just before women become sexually active. And that is why this new cervical cancer vaccine is sure to be ethically controversial.

Some conservative religious groups and family-values advocates believe that the best way to prevent any sexually transmitted disease is to teach young people to be abstinent until marriage. They don't want HPV vaccine offered to young women because it will encourage, in their view, sexual promiscuity. Or they only want the vaccine discussed by parents not in schools or in the doctor's office. But there is a big flaw in this reasoning.

Even though a woman may remain chaste until marriage she may marry someone who wasn't. She would still be at risk of infection. Given that risk, the case for getting schools, doctors, public health departments involved even if you are someone who wants to keep all talk of sex in the home starts to become very strong.