Medscape "Caution Urged Over Large-Scale HPV Vaccination Programs"

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

Caution Urged Over Large-Scale HPV Vaccination Programs

Medscape. Zosia Chustecka

August 20, 2008 — "There is good reason to be cautious about introducing large-scale vaccination programs" with the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines, because many essential questions are still unanswered. This is the conclusion of Charlotte Haug, MD, PhD, from the Journal of the Norwegian Medical Association, in Oslo, writing in an editorial in the August 21 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

"The real impact of HPV vaccination on cervical cancer will not be observable for decades," Dr. Haug comments, but there has been pressure on policy makers worldwide to introduce the HPV vaccine in national or statewide vaccination programs.

...However, Dr. Haug questions how policy makers can make "rational choices about the introduction of medical interventions that might do good in the future but for which evidence is insufficient, especially since we will not know for many years whether the intervention will work or — in the worst case — do harm?"

...In view of all the questions that remain to be answered, Dr. Haug urges more research into HPV vaccination. "We should concentrate on finding more solid answers through research rather than base consequential and costly decisions on yet-unproven assumptions," she concludes.

No conflicts of interests were reported.

N Engl J Med. 2008;359:821-832, 861-862.

[David__77]

1. This is of interest to men who have sex with men too.

This vaccine may help reduce the risks of anal cancer from HPV, which can be transmitted through anal intercourse.