Lead investigator for HPV vaccines "comes clean so she can sleep at night."

[pnwmom]

Last edited Mon Jul 1, 2013, 02:52 AM - Edit history (7)

At a medical conference, she came forward to question the safety and effectiveness of the Gardasil and Cervarix vaccines that SHE helped develop.

According to the CBS news article below, the rate of serious adverse effects in the children who receive this vaccine maybe be as much as 5 times higher than the rate of deaths of women from cervical cancer each year (including women who developed cervical cancer related to causes other than the viruses covered by the vaccine.)

I'm glad that my kids have been spared meningitis, hepatitis, tetanus and a bunch of other nasty illnesses thanks to vaccines, in addition to the common influenza strains that we all get vaccinated for every year. But it's important to realize that not all vaccines are equally safe and effective, any more than all drugs are safe and effective. I didn't hesitate to have my kids get almost all vaccines, but I thought the HPV vaccine was being pushed ahead much too quickly.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500690_162-5253431.html

Dr. Diane Harper (lead researcher for Gardasil vaccine) says young girls and their parents should receive more complete warnings before receiving the vaccine to prevent cervical cancer. Dr. Harper helped design and carry out the Phase II and Phase III safety and effectiveness studies to get Gardasil approved, and authored many of the published, scholarly papers about it. She has been a paid speaker and consultant to Merck. It's highly unusual for a researcher to publicly criticize a medicine or vaccine she helped get approved.

SNIP

According to Dr. Harper, assessing the true adverse event risk of Gardasil, and comparing it to the risk of cervical cancer can be tricky and complex. "The number of women who die from cervical cancer in the US every year is small but real. It is small because of the success of the Pap screening program."

"The risks of serious adverse events including death reported after Gardasil use in (the JAMA article by CDC's Dr. Barbara Slade) were 3.4/100,000 doses distributed. The rate of serious adverse events on par with the death rate of cervical cancer. Gardasil has been associated with at least as many serious adverse events as there are deaths from cervical cancer developing each year. Indeed, the risks of vaccination are underreported in Slade's article, as they are based on a denominator of doses distributed from Merck's warehouse. Up to a third of those doses may be in refrigerators waiting to be dispensed as the autumn onslaught of vaccine messages is sent home to parents the first day of school. Should the denominator in Dr. Slade's work be adjusted to account for this, and then divided by three for the number of women who would receive all three doses, the incidence rate of serious adverse events increases up to five fold. How does a parent value that information," said Harper.

Dr. Harper agrees with Merck and the CDC that Gardasil is safe for most girls and women. But she says the side effects reported so far call for more complete disclosure to patients. She says they should be told that protection from the vaccination might not last long enough to provide a cancer protection benefit, and that its risks - "small but real" - could occur more often than the cervical cancer itself would.

"Parents and women must know that deaths occurred. Not all deaths that have been reported were represented in Dr. Slade's work, one-third of the death reports were unavailable to the CDC, leaving the parents of the deceased teenagers in despair that the CDC is ignoring the very rare but real occurrences that need not have happened if parents were given information stating that there are real, but small risks of death surrounding the administration of Gardasil."

http://southweb.org/lifewise/the-lead-vaccine-developer-comes-clean-so-she-can-sleep-at-night-gardasil-and-cervarix-dont-work-are-dangerous-and-werent-tested/

"Gardasil And Cervarix Don’t Work, Are Dangerous, And Weren’t Tested"

Dr. Diane Harper was the lead researcher in the development of the human papilloma virus vaccines, Gardasil and Cervarix. She is the latest to come forward and question the safety and effectiveness of these vaccines. She made the surprising announcement at the 4th International Public Conference on Vaccination, which took place in Reston, Virginia on Oct. 2nd through 4th, 2009. Her speech was supposed to promote the Gardasil and Cervarix vaccines, but she instead turned on her corporate bosses in a very public way. When questioned about the presentation, audience members remarked that they came away feeling that the vaccines should not be used.

“I came away from the talk with the perception that the risk of adverse side effects is so much greater than the risk of cervical cancer, I couldn’t help but question why we need the vaccine at all.” – Joan Robinson

Dr. Harper explained in her presentation that the cervical cancer risk in the U.S. is already extremely low, and that vaccinations are unlikely to have any effect upon the rate of cervical cancer in the United States. In fact, 70% of all H.P.V. infections resolve themselves without treatment in a year, and the number rises to well over 90% in two years. Harper also mentioned the safety angle. All trials of the vaccines were done on children aged 15 and above, despite them currently being marketed for 9-year-olds. So far, 15,037 girls have reported adverse side effects from Gardasil alone to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (V.A.E.R.S.), and this number only reflects parents who underwent the hurdles required for reporting adverse reactions. At the time of writing, 44 girls are officially known to have died from these vaccines. The reported side effects include Guillian Barré Syndrome (paralysis lasting for years, or permanently — sometimes eventually causing suffocation), lupus, seizures, blood clots, and brain inflammation. Parents are usually not made aware of these risks. Dr. Harper, the vaccine developer, claimed that she was speaking out, so that she might finally be able to sleep at night.

“About eight in every ten women who have been sexually active will have H.P.V. at some stage of their life. Normally there are no symptoms, and in 98 per cent of cases it clears itself. But in those cases where it doesn’t, and isn’t treated, it can lead to pre-cancerous cells which may develop into cervical cancer.” - Dr. Diane Harper

One must understand how the establishment’s word games are played to truly understand the meaning of the above quote, and one needs to understand its unique version of “science”. When they report that untreated cases “can” lead to something that “may” lead to cervical cancer, it really means that the relationship is merely a hypothetical conjecture that is profitable if people actually believe it. In other words, there is no demonstrated relationship between the condition being vaccinated for and the rare cancers that the vaccine might prevent, but it is marketed to do that nonetheless. In fact, there is no actual evidence that the vaccine can prevent any cancer. From the manufacturers own admissions, the vaccine only works on 4 strains out of 40 for a specific venereal disease that dies on its own in a relatively short period, so the chance of it actually helping an individual is about about the same as the chance of him being struck by a meteorite. Why do nine-year-old girls need vaccinations for extremely rare and symptom-less venereal diseases that the immune system usually kills anyway?

SNIP

__________________________

Here's Dr. Harper's bio at Dartmouth College of Medicine:


http://geiselmed.dartmouth.edu/faculty/facultydb/view.php?uid=2880

[jeff47]

1. Ok, show me the dead bodies.

If it's so dangerous, somebody must have died by now from it.

I eagerly await the claims that "big pharma" is covering it up. Despite the fact that "big pharma" gets a million times more money treating diseases compared to vaccinating against them.

[Recursion]

3. I can tell you my concern: it's touted as a "cervical cancer vaccine"

But this isn't like smallpox where a given pathogen is necessary and sufficient for the condition: having either of two strains of HPV increases your chance of developing cervical cancer from something like 0.02% to something like 0.03%. Yes, that's a dramatic increase. But this isn't a vaccine against cervical cancer; it's a vaccine against a common cause of a frequent precursor to cervical cancer.

[jeff47]

5. No, it's touted as an HPV vaccine, and HPV increases the risk of cervical cancer

I have literally just heard the description of the vaccine from my daughter's doctor.

[pnwmom]

10. It was our family practice doctor who gave me this link

when I asked about the vaccine for our son.

So not every doctor has the same level of comfort with this particular vaccine.

[TeeYiYi]

4. The article says 44 deaths to date. ..nt

TYY

[jeff47]

6. K, and how many cervical cancer deaths in the same time frame? (nt)

[TeeYiYi]

7. I'm confused by your question..

The deaths were from side effects of the vaccine.

TYY

Eta:typo

[jeff47]

12. The OP makes a claim that those side effects are more dangerous than cervical cancer.

Kinda need the numbers to compare in order to make that assessment.

[TeeYiYi]

18. If the vaccine doesn't work...

...then the side effects are definitely not acceptable.

TYY

[jeff47]

20. Except the vaccine does work.

It works against the covered strains of HPV. It does not work against all known strains of HPV, nor against all causes of cervical cancer.

To judge whether or not it's a good risk to receive the vaccine, you have to have actual statistics. Not just stand up at a conference and demand you receive more funding for further study.

[TeeYiYi]

25. If it actually works against the covered strains...

...(I think it was four strains) then it might be worth the risk. HPV is a terrible std.

TYY

eta: Four strains, not two.

[pnwmom]

11. Absolutely none in the age group getting this vaccine,

98% of whom would clear this virus naturally out of their system within a few years. In the rest, precancerous changes can be detected and removed before cancer develops, through an annual pap smear -- which should be done ANYWAY, because having this vaccine doesn't protect against many other problems that can show up in a pap smear.

[jeff47]

14. So...cervical cancer is so common women need pap smears frequently

but a vaccine that eliminates a significant chunk of those cancers isn't a good idea?

[pnwmom]

23. Women will continue to need annual pap smears

because these viruses represent only a fraction of the things that can cause precancerous changes in the cervix.

But these viruses in the vast majority of cases are naturally cleared from the body.

"Dr. Harper explained in her presentation that the cervical cancer risk in the U.S. is already extremely low, and that vaccinations are unlikely to have any effect upon the rate of cervical cancer in the United States. In fact, 70% of all H.P.V. infections resolve themselves without treatment in a year, and the number rises to well over 90% in two years."

[jeff47]

32. Your argument makes no sense.

We know the 4 strains of HPV this vaccine covers cause about 70% of cervical cancers. (And please stop trying to hide behind "precancerous" as if the difference is relevant to the discussion)

Your argument is women should not get the vaccine, because they can just get a hysterectomy if their HPV infection happens to cause cancer.

Don't you think some women might think an injection is a better solution?

Especially when the side-effect dangers are the same as any other egg-based vaccine and the girl would have received many egg-based vaccines by 9, so it's unlikely that this vaccine would be her first bad reaction.

Also, you seem to be trusting Dr. Harper despite her not showing any new statistics, and she is asking for additional funding.

[pnwmom]

37. The only woman I know who ended up having stage one cervical cancer,

and who had a cone biopsy followed by a hysterectomy a couple years later, decided after careful reflection, and based on her own work at a major cancer research center, NOT to have her daughter vaccinated for HPV.

[jeff47]

39. So do I now have to explain the difference between anecdote and statistics?

Or would you like to try an argument that actually means something?

[pnwmom]

54. Did you even bother to read the statistics in the articles at the OP?

According to the CBS news article, the rate of serious adverse effects in the children who receive this vaccine maybe be as much as 5 times higher than the rate of deaths of women from cervical cancer each year (including women who developed cervical cancer related to causes other than the viruses covered by the vaccine.)

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500690_162-5253431.html

According to Dr. Harper, assessing the true adverse event risk of Gardasil, and comparing it to the risk of cervical cancer can be tricky and complex. "The number of women who die from cervical cancer in the US every year is small but real. It is small because of the success of the Pap screening program."

"The risks of serious adverse events including death reported after Gardasil use in (the JAMA article by CDC's Dr. Barbara Slade) were 3.4/100,000 doses distributed. The rate of serious adverse events on par with the death rate of cervical cancer. Gardasil has been associated with at least as many serious adverse events as there are deaths from cervical cancer developing each year. Indeed, the risks of vaccination are underreported in Slade's article, as they are based on a denominator of doses distributed from Merck's warehouse. Up to a third of those doses may be in refrigerators waiting to be dispensed as the autumn onslaught of vaccine messages is sent home to parents the first day of school. Should the denominator in Dr. Slade's work be adjusted to account for this, and then divided by three for the number of women who would receive all three doses, the incidence rate of serious adverse events increases up to five fold. How does a parent value that information," said Harper.

Dr. Harper agrees with Merck and the CDC that Gardasil is safe for most girls and women. But she says the side effects reported so far call for more complete disclosure to patients. She says they should be told that protection from the vaccination might not last long enough to provide a cancer protection benefit, and that its risks - "small but real" - could occur more often than the cervical cancer itself would.

"Parents and women must know that deaths occurred. Not all deaths that have been reported were represented in Dr. Slade's work, one-third of the death reports were unavailable to the CDC, leaving the parents of the deceased teenagers in despair that the CDC is ignoring the very rare but real occurrences that need not have happened if parents were given information stating that there are real, but small risks of death surrounding the administration of Gardasil."

[jeff47]

80. Yes. They're comparing apples and oranges

Here, lemme highlight where you should have noticed the statistics were being used to lie.

The rate of serious adverse events on par with the death rate of cervical cancer

They're comparing adverse effects to death. They should have either compared death to death or compared adverse effects to adverse effects.

Btw, death to death would yield 19,600 deaths from cancer, and 4 deaths since the vaccine was approved.

(Avg rate for death from cervical cancer is 4,000 per year. It was approved 7 years ago, and is estimated to prevent 70% of cervical cancers. 4000 * 7 * 0.7 = 19,600)

[quakerboy]

61. I assume that means since 2006

Apparently the vaccination was approved for use in 2006. According to Wikipedia, for whatever that's worth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gardasil

That would be approximately 6 deaths per year due to the vaccine

According to the CDC, 3909 women died of cervical cancer in 2009.
http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/cervical/statistics/#2

According to the same wiki page above, the strains of HPV that the vaccination covers cause an estimated 70% of Cervical Cancer instances. Again, for whatever Wikipedia is worth in providing info.

Not sure what if any difference the vaccine made in this, but cdc observes that the rate of cervical cancer has been dropping for 40 years.

[cali]

77. .....

An update on adverse events was published by the Journal of the American Medical Association and looked at data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), covering 12,424 reported adverse events after about 23 million doses of vaccine between June 2006 and December 2008.[39][40] Most adverse effects were minor and not greater than background rates compared with other vaccines, the exception being higher rates for syncope and venous thromboembolic events.[40] Venous thromboembolic events were noted in 56 reports at a rate of 0.2 cases per 100,000 doses distributed and included 19 cases of pulmonary embolism, four of which were fatal.[40] Overall, 772 events (6.2% of the total number of adverse events, but only 0.003% of the total number of doses) were described as serious and included 32 reported deaths (1 per 1,000,000 doses).[40]

Other adverse events include local site reactions (7.5 cases per 100,000 doses distributed), headaches (4.1 cases per 100,000 doses distributed), hypersensitivity reactions (3.1 cases per 100,000 doses distributed), and urticaria (hives) (2.6 cases per 100,000 doses distributed).[40] A Kaiser Permanente study tracking 190,000 girls and women post-vaccination for two years found that rates of the autoimmune disorders lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP), hemolytic anemia, multiple sclerosis, thyroiditis and type 1 diabetes mellitus in vaccinated populations were the same as in unvaccinated populations.[41][42]

The FDA and the CDC said that with millions of vaccinations "by chance alone some serious adverse effects and deaths" will occur in the time period following vaccination, but have nothing to do with the vaccine.[43] More than 20 women who received the Gardasil vaccine have died, but these deaths have not been causally connected to the shot.[43] Where information has been available, the cause of death was explained by other factors.[44][45] Likewise, a small number of cases of Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS) have been reported following vaccination with Gardasil, though there is no evidence linking GBS to the vaccine.[11][39][46] It is unknown why a person contracts GBS, or what initiates the disease.[47]

The FDA and the CDC monitor events to see if there are patterns, or more serious events than would be expected from chance alone.[44] The majority (68%) of side effects data were reported by the manufacturer, but in about 90% of the manufacturer reported events, no follow-up information was given that would be useful to investigate the event further.[40] In February 2009, the Spanish ministry of health suspended use of one batch of Gardasil after health authorities in the Valencia region reported that two girls had become ill after receiving the injection. Merck has stated that there was no evidence Gardasil was responsible for the two illnesses.[35]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gardasil#Safety

[pnwmom]

9. Did you miss this part? Or do you literally need to see dead bodies?

"So far, 15,037 girls have reported adverse side effects from Gardasil alone to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (V.A.E.R.S.), and this number only reflects parents who underwent the hurdles required for reporting adverse reactions.At the time of writing, 44 girls are officially known to have died from these vaccines. The reported side effects include Guillian Barré Syndrome (paralysis lasting for years, or permanently — sometimes eventually causing suffocation), lupus, seizures, blood clots, and brain inflammation. Parents are usually not made aware of these risks. Dr. Harper, the vaccine developer, claimed that she was speaking out, so that she might finally be able to sleep at night."

Also, it is much harder than you might think to get an adverse report filed. My son had seizures after the DPT vaccines, but the doctor didn't file a report because he said something else must have caused the seizures. (He didn't have a high fever and he never had them again after we discontinued the pertussis vaccine.) I was young and didn't know any better. It was only when a sibling also had a bad reaction that I found out my sister died one day after a DPT -- and that hadn't been reported either. (My parents were just told she'd had encephalitis but no one ever told them it was probably related to the vaccine.) Eventually, that version of the DPT was taken off the market when a safer version was developed.

Parents today should know that if their doctor won't report an adverse effect (and few will, for some reason), then they can go to the FDA and file a report themselves.

[jeff47]

15. Need to measure the danger of the vaccine vs. the disease to figure out if it's "more dangerous"

Something the OP failed to do. Even the good Doctor failed to provide numbers.

[pnwmom]

21. HPV is almost always eliminated by the body naturally, without any treatment,

and the type that turns into precancerous cells can be easily detected by annual pap smears, which need to be done anyway, to check for a host of other problems.

Another concern is that this vaccine is being given now to children as young as 9, even though no research was done on children under the age of 15.

This isn't like a vaccine for scarlet fever or meningitis or some easily contagious disease. It's only spread through sex and the virus is usually cleared by the body without any treatment. With the development of pap smears, the number of cases of cervical cancer have plummeted.

We shouldn't be approving vaccines willy-nilly for any virus that a manufacturer can create a vaccine for; we should be deciding what diseases present the greatest risks and developing vaccines against them. We shouldn't be letting the manufacturers choose for us, based on which vaccines are the easiest and most profitable for them to develop.

[jeff47]

28. Again, numbers are necessary to make an actual decision.

We know HPV does significantly increase the risk of cervical cancer. The fact that we're looking for other cervical cancers doesn't mean we shouldn't bother with the vaccine.

Another concern is that this vaccine is being given now to children as young as 9, even though no research was done on children under the age of 15.

sigh.

The human immune system doesn't change between 9 and 15. The "OMG They're giving it to younger people" sounds an awful lot like the anti-vaxxer claims that we are giving too many injections. Which is based on not knowing just how many pathogens are around us every day.

This isn't like a vaccine for scarlet fever or meningitis or some easily contagious disease. It's only spread through sex and the virus is usually cleared by the body without any treatment. With the development of pap smears, the number of cases of cervical cancer have plummeted.

Shockingly enough, some women are not fond of hysterectomies and think it would be a good idea to avoid them.

We shouldn't be approving vaccines willy-nilly for any virus that a manufacturer can create a vaccine for

We didn't.

we should be deciding what diseases present the greatest risks and developing vaccines against them.

Vaccines are not possible against the diseases that present the greatest risk. Most cancers, the common cold virus, the flu virus and a host of bacterial infections can not be effectively vaccinated against.

We shouldn't be letting the manufacturers choose for us, based on which vaccines are the easiest and most profitable for them to develop.

But whenever a researcher stands up to demand more funding, we should consider them unbiased and listen to them with rapt attention, right?

[pnwmom]

36. When a researcher wants funding for a particular vaccine or drug, we should make sure that

it's worth spending money on.

[jeff47]

41. So you just switched sides?

You were previously claiming we should do more study about the HPV vaccines.

You are now claiming it's not worth the money to study HPV vaccines.

[pnwmom]

42. The human immune system DOES change between 9 and 15. Ever hear of puberty?

And if this vaccine lasts only 5 years, which is all the research currently shows, then most children vaccinated at age 9 or 10 will have lost protection for HPV before they ever have sex. So they will have no benefit and at least some risk from the shot.

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/524225_4

The Maturing Immune System: Implications for Development and Testing HIV-1 Vaccines for Children and Adolescents

An increase in gonadotropic hormones that promote the secretion of androgens and oestrogens in both boys and girls characterize puberty. Both Leydig cells and ovaries produce testosterone and 17-?-oestradiol (17-?-E2). In normal children, testosterone levels begin to rise at a bone age of about 12 years in boys and at 10 years in girls. However, dihydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) levels begin to rise earlier, at about 7 years of age in boys and 8 years of age in girls. Both 17-?-oestradiol (17-?-E2) and testosterone levels increase substantially through the pubertal stages and are highest at pre-menopausal adulthood.[43]

Various lines of evidence suggest that immunological responses and sex steroid hormones are linked at physiological and cellular levels. The increased risk of autoimmunity among pubertal and post-pubertal females (and males to a lesser degree) strongly suggests that sex steroids affect immune function.[44] T cells and macrophages express intra- and extracellular receptors for oestrogens and androgens, implying a direct effect of these hormones on the immune system.[45] B cells, however, express only intracellular oestrogen and androgen receptors.[46] As a result, sex steroid hormones have many effects on the innate and adaptive immune system (reviewed in[47] and summarized in Table 1).

SNIP

An important change that occurs in adolescence is the gradual involution of the thymus,[58] which is the source of naive CD45RA T cells. Thymic involution has traditionally been thought to occur prior to adolescence, but in more recent studies, thymic output has been demonstrated into adulthood.[60] Nevertheless, age-related changes in thymic function may affect immune responses to vaccinations at different ages.

[jeff47]

81. Your own article doesn't support your claims.

The increased risk of autoimmunity among pubertal and post-pubertal females (and males to a lesser degree) strongly suggests that sex steroids affect immune function. T cells and macrophages express intra- and extracellular receptors for oestrogens and androgens, implying a direct effect of these hormones on the immune system. B cells, however, express only intracellular oestrogen and androgen receptors.

Guess which of those cells are relevant to vaccines? It's the last ones, after the "however"....the ones that the yare saying are not affected.

In addition, your article is full of "may _____". That's someone speculating. The fact that 7-year-olds are not significantly more likely to die from an infection than 20-year-olds tells you there is no significant change in the immune system due to puberty in regards to infection.

[SheilaT]

2. I'm glad this woman is speaking up,

but the fact that the vaccine is of extremely limited effectiveness (4 of 40 strains protected against) is information that has been out there. Also, the fact that the risk of cervical cancer is extremely low, has led many people (some of whom post here on DU) to question this vaccine from the first.

[pnwmom]

13. I think it adds weight to the skeptics' argument when the lead investigator comes out on their side.

[cali]

62. say what?

and that CBS article is fucking 4 years old. think there's been research done since then? why yes, yes there has.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023138726

[Warpy]

8. HPV vaccine seen lowering HPV infections in teen girls

http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2013/p0619-hpv-vaccinations.html

'Scuse me, but I'll get my news from people who are actually collecting and analyzing the information coming in instead of issuing hysterical pronouncements they are pulling out of their butts.

The HPV vaccine is different from other vaccines, you betcha. It protects girls from cancer causing viruses transmitted by nasty old sex.

[pnwmom]

16. So you don't trust the LEAD INVESTIGATOR in the research?

You trust her when her name is at the bottom of a paper, but not when she comes to a conference and questions it?

[jeff47]

19. She isn't presenting a paper now. She's making claims.

And she really should know she needs to back those claims up with study in a new paper.

[pnwmom]

27. She's making claims about her own papers that she already wrote.

She doesn't need to write a new one to point out the flaws in her others.

[jeff47]

38. Then why were these claims not in those papers?

So...we should trust her now because she covered those claims up in her published work?

[pnwmom]

40. Apparently she was saying what her employers wanted her to say. Now she's not. n/t

[jeff47]

82. So she'll lie for money.

Did she lie then, or is she lying now? Because now she's asking for more money.

[pnwmom]

88. Actually, that was my mistake. She didn't receive money from them for that work. n/t

[jberryhill]

26. Is she an immunologist or an epidemiologist?

[pnwmom]

34. Here's her bio. It's quite extensive.

She does have a background in epidemiology, but I don't know what her background is in immunology, or what her specialty is. But maybe you can find it here:

http://geiselmed.dartmouth.edu/faculty/facultydb/view.php?uid=2880

[longship]

29. Authority in science is not given to a person.

It is given to the research literature as a whole, especially in medicine where they're dealing with biology which is subject to the vagaries of the complexities of biological systems.

It's like the Chemistry Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling writing a book about the common cold and Vitamin C. His Nobel prize made the book a hit, but it didn't stop all the research indicating that it was a lot of bunkum, in other words, no connection.

Still, ignorant people today take vitamin C when they have colds because it has sank into the culture. They're not reducing colds as much as increasing incidents of kidney stones in the population, which is apparently connected to vitamin C supplementation.

[pnwmom]

30. No, but as the lead researcher in Phase 2 and 3 research on those vaccines, she is better positioned

than most people to be an authority.

[longship]

44. No position except for the literature as a whole!

I will repeat. No one person, no matter their previous work in science, has any prominence beyond how their work stands up against nature, and the only arbiter of that is the consensus of both the research and other scientists in the discipline.

There are no Popes in science. That's just not how it works. Dr. Harper's paper will have to go through peer review just like all others.

This is an interesting article but I am skeptical because of all the other research I have heard of on HPV vaccine in the past few years, especially that of recent research which seems to falsify the claims of Dr. Harper.

[pnwmom]

45. The other research shows that the number of HPV cases caused by those strains has decreased.

But that won't necessarily make women safer over the long run since, for one thing, we still don't know how long the vaccines work. Cervical cancer typically takes decades to develop and it's too early to see what the effect of the vaccine will be on those deaths.

This is from the first article in the OP:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500690_162-5253431.html

She also worries that Merck's aggressive marketing of the vaccine may have given women a false sense of security. "The future expectations women hold because they have received free doses of Gardasil purchased by philanthropic foundations, by public health agencies or covered by insurance is the true threat to cervical cancer in the future. Should women stop Pap screening after vaccination, the cervical cancer rate will actually increase per year. Should women believe this is preventive for all cancers - something never stated, but often inferred by many in the population-- a reduction in all health care will compound our current health crisis. Should Gardasil not be effective for more than 15 years, the most costly public health experiment in cancer control will have failed miserably."

[longship]

47. Gees, Louise! This is a vaccination that prevents fucking cancer.

Of course, the anti-vaccination people are going to be against it. As well as the loony loony religious wackos because HPV can be a sexually transmitted virus.

The forces against the HPV vaccine are all ideological and always have been.

I will have to get back to you on this Dr. Harper. But, from what I have heard about the HPV vaccine as recently as this month (Canadian study -- will have to look it up) is that it saves lives. BIG TIME!

Who wants to have uterine cancer? This is a vaccine that prevents it.

Sheesh!

[pnwmom]

50. I would like to see the study that proves the vaccine has reduced cancer deaths

rather than merely diagnosed HPV cases.

Dr. Harper is not an anti-vaccination person. She is a pro-vaccination person who has spent her career working on vaccines.

This is an article about her in the heady early days after Gardasil came out, when she was involved in the promotion.

http://dartmed.dartmouth.edu/fall06/html/faculty_focus.php

Here is her current bio, with publications, at Dartmouth College of Medicine. She's not some flake.

http://geiselmed.dartmouth.edu/faculty/facultydb/view.php?uid=2880

[longship]

55. Sorry, but here you go.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023138726

This link is probably why this thread was posted here. The anti-vaccination movement is strong, most unfortunately.

The anti-HPV vaccine movement is particularly strong in the the Christian fundementalist movement because HPV can be a sexually transmitted disease.

But here's the deal. The Human Papilloma Virus is responsible for cervical cancer. So now that we have an HPV vaccine we have a vaccine that can prevent cancer.

That's a fucking pretty good deal!

But the religious right do not want the HPV vaccine to become available for their children -- EVEN THOUGH IT CAN PREVENT CANCER. Why? Because the HPV can be transmitted by sexual intercourse.

All the research on the HPV vaccine shows that it is effective. And I mean ALL of the best research. The only ones who oppose it have an ideological bone to pick.

Either anti-vaccine in general (loonies like Jenny McCarthy and the like), or religious lunatics who don't like it because the HPV can be transmitted by sexual intercourse. The latter's argument is the vaccination will promote sexual promiscuity.

IT FUCKING PREVENTS CANCER!

[pnwmom]

68. Sorry, but you're still avoiding the issue of cancer deaths rather than HPV cases.

What you don't seem to understand is that in most women, the HPV virus is cleared by their body without any treatment. Only a small fraction go on to cause cancer -- and there are other factors that can also cause cervical cancer, including many more HPV viruses than are covered by the vaccine. So the fact that there are fewer HPV cases is positive but doesn't prove there will be fewer cancer deaths -- and not enough to make up for serious adverse effects.

The other problem is that the vaccine has to remain effective for at least 15 years or it might actually result in MORE cancer deaths over the long run. The research hasn't been ongoing long enough to prove this one way or another.

From the CBS article:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500690_162-5253431.html

She also worries that Merck's aggressive marketing of the vaccine may have given women a false sense of security. "The future expectations women hold because they have received free doses of Gardasil purchased by philanthropic foundations, by public health agencies or covered by insurance is the true threat to cervical cancer in the future. Should women stop Pap screening after vaccination, the cervical cancer rate will actually increase per year. Should women believe this is preventive for all cancers - something never stated, but often inferred by many in the population-- a reduction in all health care will compound our current health crisis. Should Gardasil not be effective for more than 15 years, the most costly public health experiment in cancer control will have failed miserably."

[ohheckyeah]

92. It has nothing to do with uterine cancer.

Cervical cancer, anal cancers, some vaginal, vulvar, penile, and oropharyngeal cancers.

[longship]

49. See my post below. #48 nt

[Warpy]

33. NOPE.

Thanks, but I'll trust the data actually being collected and analyzed.

ETA: I also remember how many Bush appointees were packed onto that team to discredit it so the preachers wouldn't get mad.

[pnwmom]

35. But she's been collecting much of the data that other people have been relying on to analyze. n/t

[Deep13]

71. I trust the scientific process, not any one person. nt

[longship]

17. Sorry! Not buying this.

Last edited Mon Jul 1, 2013, 02:16 AM - Edit history (1)

It smacks of classic anti-vaccine rubbish.

I will bookmark this and be back, but all the science, and I do mean ALL the science, on HPV vaccine indicates that it saves people's lives.

I'll be back!!!

Read at this link, which is probably why this ignorant anti-vaccination thread was posted here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023138726

Three things have extended human life spans, above all others.

1. Indoor plumbing. (Thank you Thomas Crapper!)
2. Germ theory if disease. (Thank you, Louis Pasteur.)
3. Vaccines. (Thank you, Edward Jenner.)

1. Cholera gone in much of the world.
2. Revolution in medicine. Buh-bye magic medicine like bleeding, humors, homeopathy (sadly, there are many who still think that magic works), leeches, etc.
3. Buh bye Smallpox -- it's gone, forever. Soon, if the anti-vaxxers are defeated, we can beat polio, too. Fuck Jenny McCarthy and her idiot followers. Vaccines work!

[Deep13]

73. +1

[JaneyVee]

22. The HPV vaccine has been rigorously studied. It saves lives.

[pnwmom]

24. The lead investigator on the Gardasil vaccine might actually know something about this.

For one thing, she points out that it has NEVER been studied on children under the age of 15, yet it is being marketed to children as young as 9.

[arikara]

31. It really isn't worth engaging with them

its always the same few spewing forth on antivaxers and their "science", and doing their utmost to ruin any threads on the subject. Although I highly doubt that they ever change any minds.

[cali]

43. bullshit. anti-vaxxer garbage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/22/opinion/a-surprisingly-successful-hpv-vaccine.html?_r=0

[neverforget]

46. What you said.

[pnwmom]

52. The person speaking out was a lead researcher in the development of the vaccines.

She's anything but an anti-vaxxer. She's spent her career working on developing vaccines.

And the article you posted relates to a drop in HPV cases, not to a drop in cancer deaths. That's a very different thing.

The problems she cites are not so easily dismissed. For example, as an epidemiologist, she says that the vaccine has to be effective for 15 years for it to reduce cancer deaths; so far the research only proves it is effective for five. So if a child is vaccinated age 9 or 10, it may have lost all effectiveness before s/he actually has sex. So in that case s/he has been exposed to some risk for no benefit.

There was a lot more in the CBS article, including;

"The risks of serious adverse events including death reported after Gardasil use in (the JAMA article by CDC's Dr. Barbara Slade) were 3.4/100,000 doses distributed. The rate of serious adverse events on par with the death rate of cervical cancer. Gardasil has been associated with at least as many serious adverse events as there are deaths from cervical cancer developing each year. Indeed, the risks of vaccination are underreported in Slade's article, as they are based on a denominator of doses distributed from Merck's warehouse. Up to a third of those doses may be in refrigerators waiting to be dispensed as the autumn onslaught of vaccine messages is sent home to parents the first day of school. Should the denominator in Dr. Slade's work be adjusted to account for this, and then divided by three for the number of women who would receive all three doses, the incidence rate of serious adverse events increases up to five fold. How does a parent value that information," said Harper.

[cali]

56. sorry, but the actual scientific evidence overwhelmingly supports the efficacy and safety of this

vaccine.

fucking period.

anti-vaxxer shit is a scourge.

[longship]

48. Enough of this anti-vaccination bullshit!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023138726

[cali]

59. the op shamefully uses an ancient CBS article to push her disgusting anti-vaxxer

agenda. The CBS article is 4 years old- and in terms of scientific research, that's ancient.

fuck the anti-vaxxer agenda.

[longship]

70. Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!

We have a winner.

Thanks, Cali. You saved me some investigative work. I do not like anti-vaxxers. They make shit up.

Thank you for helping.

[DeSwiss]

51. What I find humorous......

...are all these ''scientific experts and defenders'' who throw their pharma-filled bodies at the feet of their science GOD, when for 300 million years we survived the worst shit imaginable without their asses. And still we evolved. Well, some of us did.

- How the fuck did we do it? Oh yeah, Mother Nature. Right.


[center]''Let food be thy medicine, and let thy medicine be food.'' Hippocrates[/center]

K&R

[Gravitycollapse]

53. Actually, human beings have been dying from preventable illnesses for thousands of years.

There's nothing humorous about that.

[pnwmom]

58. What I find amusing is that they love ANY kind of whistleblowers except

vaccination whistleblowers.

I think vaccines are great. I get my flu shot every year and my kids had almost all of the vaccines . But sometimes you have to draw a line and I'm drawing mine my line here -- unless I see real long-term data showing it actually results in more lives saved than lives ruined.

[DeSwiss]

66. I know on political issues you and I don't always agree.....

...but you're dead-on correct here. Most of the medicines on the market and in our cabinets at home, are there as a result of a reliance upon the pharmaceutical company to provide truthful data of the trials and lab experiments prior to its approval by the FDA. We do this because of an erroneous belief that science has ethical standards that wouldn't allow them to release something detrimental onto the public -- which is an mistaken belief since they do not such ethical standards. As seen here, it takes individuals to stand up and they are almost always immediately, and roundly ridiculed (as we can see from some of the posts here).

And we know the business interests who own and control these pharmaceutical companies don't have any morals. They are making calculated decisions pitting lawsuits against profits as the primary decision-point nexus to reach on whether a drug or treatment protocol gets the go-ahead.

And then the FDA commissioners, once retired, has relatives of theirs, or they themselves go to work on the boards of directors of the very same companies s/he once regulated. And no one says a damned word at this corrupted system.

- So anyone who doesn't question these practices, is being foolish, in my view.


[center][/center]

They kept trying to tell us. Ike. Then JFK. And Senators Frank Church and Daniel Inouye. Then the revelations seemed to just stop. Maybe they were in control now. It all sounds so absurd, doesn't it? No one wants to even consider it. And if you repeat it, you're just another crazy CT. That's the beauty of it. It's a self-correcting system of oversight integrity which relies principally upon its victims to protect its existence through their own ignorance and incredulity. And through the constant use of ridicule against those able to see things more objectively and realistically, they maintain a consistent hard outer shell made of incredulous, unknowing people. Because it is understood in our society that being accused of being stupid is the one thing an truly ignorant person hates to be accused of the most.

Unethical human experimentation in the United States

[cali]

60. Sorry, but the evidence that this is an extraordinarily effective vaccine

that saves lives.

your claim that for 300 million years we survived the worst shit imaginable without pharmaceuticals is so dumb as to not deserve any response.

[DeSwiss]

69. And yet you responded to it. So who's really the dumb one here?

Rhetorical question: Did it ever occur to you that many of the diseases we're so hot for curing, are ones we gave ourselves as a direct result of ''progress?''

- Probably not.


Bye-bye

[pnwmom]

74. Where is the evidence that it actually saves lives -- not just reduces the number of cases

of these particular strains of HPV, which are normally cleared by the body naturally? Where is the evidence that its effectiveness lasts long enough to actually reduce deaths from cervical cancer (i.e., at least 15 years)?

[Apophis]

67. So, don't ever get another tetanus shot or MMR shot.

After all, people survived 300 million years without them.

[DeSwiss]

72. Well what do ya know, another zero-sum sycophant.

- Easier than thinking for yourself I suppose......

[cali]

57. disgraceful op. simply disgraceful and misleading crap.

you use a fucking old CBS article- 4 years old. and Harper was a researcher not the fucking lead researcher.

discredited shit.

thanks for posting.

NOT.

Anti-vaxxers are shameful.

[pnwmom]

63. I'm not an anti-vaxxer. Name calling doesn't impress anyone but other name callers, cali.

And it just draws attention to your ignorance. A principle investigator, which she was, is a lead researcher -- in the academic world, if not to everyone on DU.

This is what they were saying about her when they were using her to promote their vaccines:

http://dartmed.dartmouth.edu/fall06/html/faculty_focus.php

Harper was a principal investigator for clinical vaccine trials for both Merck and GlaxoSmithKline—each of which has developed an HPV vaccine. She first became involved with the trials in the early 1990s because she had been developing self-collection methods for HPV and Pap smears. Having a method for women to collect cervical samples themselves would be an important component of the trials, so both companies sought her expertise. Her long-term involvement with the studies—and the fact that neither company paid her—have made her a credible spokesperson on the subject. Last year, she traveled almost non-stop, to more than 60 countries, to educate health-care workers and policy-makers about HPV and the new vaccines.

"I'm one of the very few people who can give a balanced talk because I've been in both trials," says Harper. She discusses each vaccine as a scientific, public-health advance rather than as "a product from a particular company," she explains. "I think that's a real advantage. . . . It allows you to bring out multiple ideas."


__________________

And here's her bio. It surpasses yours, I bet.


http://geiselmed.dartmouth.edu/faculty/facultydb/view.php?uid=2880

[cali]

64. you're pushing anti-vaxxer crap.

Why HPV vaccination makes a difference against cancer

HPV is a group of more than 100 very common viruses, about 40 of which can be transmitted sexually, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office on Women's Health. Approximately 79 million Americans are currently infected with an HPV strain, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports, and nearly all sexually active men and women will get one type of sexually transmitted HPV in their lifetime.

Specifically, 20 million people in the U.S. between the ages of 15 to 49 are infected with a genital HPV at any given time, and about half of men and women can expect to be infected with genital HPV in their lifetime.


<snip>

Currently, two vaccines exist that can provide protection from some of the most dangerous strains of HPV. Gardasil, which is Food and Drug Administration-approved for people between the ages of nine to 26, provides protection from HPV types 6, 11, 16, and 18. Strains 16 and 18 are behind the leading causes of cervical and other cancers, and 6 and 11 cause genital warts. Cervarix only provides protection for strains 16 and 18, and is only approved for women between 10 and 25.

<snip>

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-204_162-57588771/why-hpv-vaccination-makes-a-difference-against-cancer/
"The vaccines that are available right now are one of our only protections against HPV," Dr. Nieca Goldberg, director of the Joan H. Tisch Center for Women's Health at NYU Langone Medical Center, told CBSNews.com.

[pnwmom]

65. The vast majority of girls and women clear HPV from their bodies after a couple years

and pap smears have been extremely successful in catching cases that do occur.

Meanwhile, the vaccinations against a few strains are causing other strains of HPV to rise in their place -- which was predicted all along. Two of my young relatives dutifully got the vaccine but recently found out they both have HPV anyway -- strains that aren't covered by the vaccine that are now more common.

[cali]

75. It's pointless to attempt a discussion with anti-vaxxer nuts. n/t

bye bye

[pnwmom]

78. There aren't any of them here, but thanks for your opinion. n/t

[AdHocSolver]

76. My own experience with respect to an early flu vaccine may be of interest.

Back in the mid-1970's I worked in a hospital that was a "test" site for a flu vaccine.

The employees were to take the flu shots in order to protect the patients from employees who might get sick.

My department was taken to the clinic to receive the vaccine. Before getting the vaccine, we were told to sign a release form that essentially said that we wouldn't sue the hospital or the drug manufacturer if we got sick or suffered side effects.

I refused to sign and so did another employee in my department. We were told that we wouldn't receive the vaccine without signing the release form, and it was hinted that, if we got sick, then we might risk losing our jobs. Having worked at the hospital and for a medical equipment manufacturer, I still refused and so did the other employee.

A few days after the flu shots were administered, most of the people who got the vaccine became sick and many stayed home from work. The other employee and myself never got even a sniffle.

I also worked for a few universities where I observed and. in one case worked for, a group of research professors. The preeminent motivation of professors and the administration is to keep the grant money flowing. The backstabbing politicking that goes on among researchers to get the research grants is amazing to behold, but outsiders would never guess what goes on. You have to see it up close to appreciate what goes on.

The flip side is that "junior" researchers never contradict the top money-getters if they want to remain in or advance in their field.

[pnwmom]

79. It is interesting to see all the big-pharma fans here,

who are concerned about every other type of major corporation, but somehow put complete faith in this one subset.

I'm not anti-vax. I appreciate all the vaccines I've allowed my kids to get -- which includes all but the old version of pertussis (the new one is fine) and now Gardasil. But since I don't think every vaccine is equally safe, effective, or necessary, some people come out with knives drawn.

[oregonjen]

84. I'm right there with you and your thinking

As a parent, I want my kids to be safe and i'm not sure the benefits outweigh the risks. My kids have gotten all the required vaccines, as well as flu shots. I'm not anti-vax, just a concerned parent, trying to do the best I can for my kids.

[Trekologer]

83. There is so much sensationalism in those articles it makes my head hurt

"So far, 15,037 girls have reported adverse side effects from Gardasil alone to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (V.A.E.R.S.), and this number only reflects parents who underwent the hurdles required for reporting adverse reactions."

Hurdles? Report side effects to doctor, doctor reports to VAERS. Done. Or report yourself by filling out the enormously long one page form online (here: http://vaers.hhs.gov/esub/index), by mail (postage paid, by the way), or fax.


"At the time of writing, 44 girls are officially known to have died from these vaccines."

That is blatantly false. Correlation does not equal causation. In each case of death, the cause was identified as something other than the vaccine (in at least one case, a car crash). For patients that developed blood clots, 90% had a known risk for blood clots due to other factors (such as smoking or taking birth-control). The bottom line is that there is no statistically significant increased risk of adverse effects following vaccination.

[pnwmom]

86. Yes, hurdles. When I was a young parent and didn't know any better,

my son had small seizures with the old DPT vaccine. Although his fever wasn't high (no more than 102), it and the screaming/shaking episodes persisted for a week. My pediatrician thought there was no connection with the vaccine and never reported the reaction and never told me that I could have reported it. How was I, as a young parent, to know about reporting to the FDA if my doctor didn't tell me? Doctors like him use circular reasoning. My son had an atypical reaction; therefore the doctor thought it couldn't have been caused by the vaccine; therefore he discounted it and didn't report it. So the FDA never hears about many atypical reactions.

We had moved to a new city when it was time for my son to get his next booster, so we had a new doctor, thank goodness. I happened to mention to my mother that I was dreading the next round of vaccines, and that's when I first learned that my sister had developed seizures and DIED the day after her 6 month vaccines. In the hospital, they had diagnosed her with encephalitis, but the doctor wrote "pneumonia" on the death certificate. Somehow, she had gone to her well-baby visit and died of "pneumonia" within 24 hours. (And so that's what I'd been hearing my whole life -- that my sister suddenly died of pneumonia.) My new pediatrician pointed out that whooping cough (part of the DPT vaccine) causes a severe form of pneumonia, and she so stopped giving the vaccine to my son -- just switched to the Dt. (My daughter and niece had already had the pertussis part stopped because they'd developed the above 105 degree fevers that the FDA recognized as a reason not to get the vaccine.) And THEN my mother called to say she remembered that her cousin had died of a vaccine reaction, and another cousin had been permanently paralyzed -- but they were told it was a bad batch of the vaccine!

So yeah, you can say "correlation does not equal causation" till you're blue in the face but you'll never convince a family whose baby suffered seizures and died, within 24 hours of a vaccine, that there wasn't a connection.

P.S. Thankfully the DPT vaccine available now is much safer and my family has gotten boosters without incident. But this only came about because the "anti-vaxx" people were vehement in demanding a safer vaccine.

[Trekologer]

96. The Vaccine Information Statement has the information

Vaccine Information Statements are required by law to be given to patients (or parents/guardians) for many vaccines (including flu, HPV, and vaccines that are typically required by children to attend public schools). The VIS includes information about the vaccine, what reactions might be expected, and (most importantly for these purposes) what to look for in a serious reaction (typical symptoms of allergic reactions) and about VAERS and how to report adverse reactions.

[SidDithers]

85. VAERS data is notoriously bad. Anyone can submit anything into VAERS...

And it will get recorded without investigation.

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/01/18/how-vaccine-litigation-distorts-the-vaer/

Advocates who are convinced of a link between the mercury in thimerosal used in vaccines as a preservative and autism often point to data derived from the U. S. Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) as “evidence” that vaccines cause autism. For example, Mark and David Geier, the father-son team of Don Quixotes of the thimerosal/autism movement, have made a veritable career of dumpster-diving the VAERS database and then using the results as their preferred lance to tilt at their windmills–not to mention to use as “evidence” in representing parents suing the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VCIP). Publications by the Geiers utilizing the VAERS database are often used by litigants as “evidence” for a link between mercury in vaccines and autism.

Unfortunately, the VAERS database is highly unreliable. The reason is that anyone can submit a report to it, and no one actually verifies the accuracy of the report. Indeed, James Laidler once tested the system by submitting a report that the influenza virus had turned him into The Incredible Hulk. The report was accepted and duly entered into the database. This report was so out of the ordinary that a representative actually contacted him and, amazingly, asked his permission to remove the report from the database (proving that it’s not easy being green). If Laidler had not given it, the report of an adverse reaction in which the flu vaccine turned a man into a huge, immensely powerful green monster would still be in VAERS. Now, via Kathleen Seidel, who alerted me to this, comes more evidence of the corruption of the VAERS database. This evidence comes in the form of a study by Michael J. Goodman and James Nordin published in the most recent issue of the journal Pediatrics, in which the authors examine the question of how much of the seeming increase in autism related to vaccines reported to the VAERS database over the last several years might be related to litigation. Naturally, I couldn’t resist downloading the complete article and reading it.

In the study, the authors, did something incredibly simple that no one had done before. They took data from the VAERS database from 1990 through 2003 and imported it into SAS data files for analysis. Then they searched the database using key words to look for reports associated with litigation, particularly with regards to autism. They searched for records containing “thimerosal,” “mercury,” or “autism” in their fields, especially when coupled with terms like “lawyer,” “legal,” “attorney,” or “litigate,” while excluding records containing “legal” coupled with the term “guardian” that did not relate to litigation. They also excluded cases related to well characterized allergic reactions to thimerosal. Finally, they compared records from nonlitigation cases to those from litigation cases regarding symptomatology reported.

Not surprisingly, beginning in 2001, they noted a dramatic increase in the number of non-Lyme disease VAERS reports related to litigation, from only 7 in 2000 to 213 in 2002 and 108 in 2003. (They attributed the decline in 2003 reports to processing delays in creating public use files.) Next, they examined symptom sets related to symptom sets. For autism, they observed a dramatic increase in the percentage of litigation-related reports from 0% of the reports related to litigation in 1999 to over one-third (35%) in 2002. For records mentioning thimerosal that weren’t related to allergic reactions, the rise was even more dramatic, from 0% of these reports related to litigation in 2000 to 87% in 2002.

Sid

[pnwmom]

87. It is just as likely to understate side effects since most parents don't know

they can report reactions there, and most doctors don't bother.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3155128

[NoodleyAppendage]

89. So...don't get the vaccine, but stop with the propaganda bullish*t.

Frankly, if I had received the vaccine in my late teens I would not have had to suffer through TWO YEARS of throat cancer treatment and the threat of leaving my wife and young children without their father.

My daughters will be vaccinated for HPV. THEY WILL LIVE FREE OF HPV-related cancer...unlike their father.

J

[pnwmom]

90. I'm so very sorry this happened to you. But the vaccine covers only 4 of the 40 HPV strains

so HPV related cancer will continue to be a possibility for anyone who's sexually active -- i.e., most of us.

I have two close relatives who got the vaccine and both the boosters -- and within two years had been diagnosed with a different HPV strain not covered by the vaccine. It's very important for girls who've had the vaccine to continue to have regular pap smears to pick up changes caused by other HPV strains.

You are right -- everyone has to make their own decision on this.

Again, I'm so sorry about what has happened to you, and I sincerely hope you are in permanent remission.

[NoodleyAppendage]

91. By your response, you reveal your ignorance of the issue.

Yes, you are correct. The vaccines only cover a small minority of the HPV strains out there...but, the strains they cover are EXACTLY the ones that are KNOWN/PROVEN to cause HPV-related cancer. HPV-16 in particular is a nasty strain and is covered by the vaccine.

In any event, WHY DO YOU CARE? If you are scared of the vaccine, then please avoid it. Feel free to put your children at risk for preventable cancer. It's a free country (sort of). But, spreading this disinformation crap does no one a service other than maybe helping you reinforce your biases.

J

[pnwmom]

93. If the vaccine doesn't work for at least 15 years, women might have a false sense of security

and the number of cases might actually increase.

Also, you are wrong about the vaccine covering ALL cancer related forms of HPV. 30% of HPV cases come from strains not covered in the vaccine.

http://uhs.berkeley.edu/home/healthtopics/hpv.shtml

There are approximately 40 different HPV types associated with vulvar, vaginal or cervical infection and disease. Gardasil protects against 4 important HPV types.

Gardasil does not protect against the HPV types responsible for 30% of cervical cancer.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-500690_162-5253431.html

She also worries that Merck's aggressive marketing of the vaccine may have given women a false sense of security. "The future expectations women hold because they have received free doses of Gardasil purchased by philanthropic foundations, by public health agencies or covered by insurance is the true threat to cervical cancer in the future. Should women stop Pap screening after vaccination, the cervical cancer rate will actually increase per year. Should women believe this is preventive for all cancers - something never stated, but often inferred by many in the population-- a reduction in all health care will compound our current health crisis. Should Gardasil not be effective for more than 15 years, the most costly public health experiment in cancer control will have failed miserably."

[NoodleyAppendage]

94. Again. Why do you care?

Just don't vaccinate yourself or your family members...and hope for the best.

[pnwmom]

95. I care for the same reason you care.

I think people should be well educated on every vaccine or drug they choose to use, and that means hearing both sides.

Pap smears will continue to be necessary whether or not women are vaccinated against HPV. My main concern is that women not be lulled into a false sense of security -- and neglect pap smears -- because of having the vaccine. Fortunately my two young relatives who have potentially cancer causing strains of HPV (not covered by the vaccine) have found out early and will be vigilant about their pap smears.