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CONSERVATIVES FOR CANCER
New HPV vaccine fought
BY DEIRDRE FULTON

Adding fuel to the perception that all right-wingers think about is sex — and who’s having it — conservatives have spent the past few weeks fighting a new vaccine that could help prevent cervical cancer. Never mind that it could quell an insidious disease that kills 290,000 women worldwide, and almost 4000 in the United States every year. Forget that it would target human papillomavirus (HPV), the most common sexually transmitted infection. And toss aside the fact that even with HPV out of the picture, people who have sex would still run the risk of contracting all other STDs, such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, or HIV. Conservatives are willing to forget all the benefits because they think it’ll lead more teenagers to have unsafe sex.

So-called pro-family organizations — the same ones that oppose over-the-counter sales of the morning-after pill, despite its proven effectiveness in lowering the national rate of abortion, because they claim it encourages unprotected sex — worry that a universal vaccine would act as a tacit permission slip for teenagers to engage in premarital sex.

See, HPV — the leading cause of cervical cancer — is contracted through sexual acts. Anywhere from 50 to 80 percent of Americans will be infected with the (relatively harmless) virus at some point in their sexually active lives, and most cases will go away on their own. But some strains will cause cancer.

The vaccine, which is being developed by Merck Research Laboratories and GlaxoSmithKline, is said to guard against all types of HPV. The companies claim it would be most effective when administered before the advent of sexual activity — between 10 and 12 years old, experts say.

And that’s what’s raising the eyebrows and ire of right-wingers.

"While we welcome medical advances ... it remains clear that practicing abstinence until marriage and fidelity within marriage is the single best way of preventing the full range of sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancies, and negative psychological and emotional consequences that can result from sexual activity outside marriage," reads a statement from the conservative Family Research Council.

It’s the same basic argument that conservatives use time and time again against comprehensive sexual education, both in Massachusetts and nationally. (A statewide coalition led by the Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts is currently pushing for a comprehensive health-education bill in the legislature; part of that bill would make sex ed a part of every Massachusetts curriculum.)

"There’s no evidence that a vaccine will affect someone’s ... sexual activity," says pediatrician Scott Spear, who is the national medical director for Planned Parenthood. Conservative opposition, he says, "is coming from a moralistic viewpoint, not a scientific one."

Sounds familiar. When vaccine manufacturers take their product to the federal Food and Drug Administration at the end of the year, they’ll face the same agency that was criticized earlier this week for improperly injecting politics into a decision not to allow over-the-counter sales of Plan B, or the morning-after pill. Let’s hope that this time, science trumps ideology.


Issue Date: November 18 - 24, 2005
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