Rick Perry's HPV Vaccine Law Sparks Political Fight That Ignores Health Issues
by Laura Bassett
9/13/11
As the Republican presidential field continues to attack Texas Gov. Rick Perry's executive order mandating the HPV vaccine for young girls, health advocates are growing worried that the vaccine itself is being stigmatized.
In the two most recent presidential debates, Perry has had to repeatedly explain and defend the executive order, which he says he signed in order to help prevent girls from developing cervical cancer as a result of the sexually transmitted virus. But his fellow Republican candidates have seized the opportunity to attack him over the issue, at times using some alarming and misleading rhetoric about the vaccine.
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) blasted Perry for the vaccine mandate on Monday, calling it a "government injection" of a "potentially dangerous drug." Then Tuesday morning, she insinuated to NBC's "Today Show" that the vaccine can cause mental retardation.
"I will tell you that I had a mother last night come up to me here in Tampa, Florida, after the debate," Bachmann said. "She told me that her little daughter took that vaccine, that injection, and she suffered from mental retardation thereafter."
Santorum also painted an alarming picture of the vaccine mandate during Monday night's debate, describing it as "having little girls inoculated at the force and compulsion of the government."
Health care advocates are worried that all the negative rhetoric could cause the public to sour on the HPV vaccine itself, which has been proven to dramatically reduce the risk of contracting the particular strains of the virus that cause cervical cancer.
"The HPV vaccine has been shown to be safe and well-tolerated based on multiple medical reports that have been submitted through government databases," Dr. Renata Arrington-Sanders, a professor at Johns Hopkins University medical school, told HuffPost. "It's unfortunate that this particular vaccine is surrounded by a lot of controversy just because it's been labeled as an STD-prevention vaccine. We have similar vaccines, such as one for hepatitis B, that are also used in a mandated approach and have shown very successful rates with prevention."
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), cervical cancer is the second leading cancer killer of women in the world. Almost 70 percent of cervical cancer cases and 90 percent of cases of genital warts are linked to the four strains of HPV that can be prevented with Merck's Gardasil vaccine or GlaxoSmithKline's Cervarix...
For the full article, go to:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/13/rick-perry-hpv-vaccine_n_961159.html
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