Why are parents so leery of the HPV vaccine?
The first human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine was licensed in 2006 and despite tens of millions of doses being safely administered according to experts, parents don’t seem to be any more comfortable with the vaccine today.
“Concerns about safety and side effects for the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine — one of the newest shots recommended for adolescents — has increased among parents: 16% cited these fears as the main reason they did not have their daughters vaccinated in 2010, up from 5% in 2008, a new study finds.
“And the percentage of parents who said they did not intend to vaccinate their daughters against HPV in the next 12 months also grew, from 40% in 2008 to 41% in 2009 to 44% in 2010, even as parents reported increasing physician recommendations to get the shot, says the study in April’s Pediatrics, released online Monday.
“According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, HPV vaccines offer the best protection to girls and boys who receive all three vaccine doses and have time to develop an immune response before being sexually active with another person.
“Parental anxiety over the safety of other new adolescent vaccines — the tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis booster Tdap, (and a version called Td without the pertussis portion) and the meningococcal disease shot MCV4 — did not show a similar increase.”
HPV is a group of sexually transmitted viruses passed through genital contact – most often during vaginal or anal sex but can also be spread through oral sex. The vaccine is recommended for boys and girls 11 to 12 years old.
We discussed this when the vaccine first came out. I can’t find the story because my archive doesn’t go back that far in this system, but I remember many moms saying that wanted to wait a while to see what shook out. At the time my oldest was too young for it, and I was glad I didn’t have to make that decision then, but guess what? Now she is exactly the age they are targeting with the vaccine. So in the next year or so, we will have to make a decision about it.
So have you done it? Did you hold out? Did you give it to your son as well? Where do you stand on it now?
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83 comments Add your comment
Parent
March 19th, 2013
3:03 pm
“More children take more vaccinations now than at any time in our history.”
What PERCENTAGE (not just raw numbers) of children are vaccinated?
Rose`
March 19th, 2013
4:12 pm
I can’t even read all the comments because I’m actually amazed at how many parents think “their” kids won’t be having sex. Really?? You are in for a rude awakening.
non committal mind reader
March 19th, 2013
4:35 pm
She actually states that the risk of death with cervical cancer is the “same” as the risk of serious adverse affects with Gardasil. And, she states that the risk of serious adverse effects may be greater than the risk of cervical cancer the vaccine is intended to prevent.
BINGO! At least I didn’t read through ALL of the comments before at least one person made the first non-emotional case that defines the risk correctly. Once you realize that the odds of a serious adverse side affect are about the same as the odds of dying of the disease that it prevents, one is left with the question, why?
The only reasonable explanation is that if enough kids get vaccinated for a long enough period of time, the disease mostly goes away. This make good sense when the disease is rubella, or polio, or other communicable diseases that (without a vaccine) would ravage our communities. But even now, when HPV “ravages” our community, few people die from it. Thus, the HPV vaccine is expensive, takes three shots, and then does not reduce the suffering in our community… we simply swap one type of suffering (cancer) for another (the serious adverse side affect of the vaccine).
Not only that, if we were to subject boys to this vaccine, their possible adverse side affects FAR OUTWEIGH their risk. You who are giving your boys the vaccine might thinks its cute to “protect the girls”, but you are subjecting them to a potential serious risk… a risk that they do not have even if they catch the disease. Looking at it from a risk standpoint, you are STUPID to give this vaccine to your boys!
So getting this vaccine, if you are a girl, swaps one risk for another, and costs you a lot of money to do so. It is definitely worth it to society for girls to do this. It may not be worth it to the individual girl to do so.
Getting this vaccine as a boy exposes you to risk that you would have never been exposed to. While society may benefit, it is definitely NOT worth it to the individual boy to do so.
Ann
March 19th, 2013
5:14 pm
@ Parent – I don’t know where you got your figures. I have seen other numbers regarding deaths totaling over 100 and other adverse event numbers. Google “the truth about gardasil” to see information. Furthermore, all experts agree that “adverse events” are way under-reported. In a lot of cases, the calls to report are simply not made, either because the medical provider does not take time to report it or the parent does not know about the reporting process. I guess you are telling your daughters or other female relatives to not get mammograms or pap smears since they don’t “prevent” anything, in your belief.
I am not opposed to all vaccinations. What I am “for” is an honest, up-front declaration of known and possible risks for each vaccine so that parents, including myself, can make informed choices about each one. The CDC introductory article on the HPV vaccine simply talks about “most common” risks, listing fairly minor things, which downplay the risk information. And, there is a vague statement about serious adverse events being “under study”. Why no mention of the auto-immune disorders that one of the creators of the vaccine talks about? Do we continue to vaccinate millions of kids while we wait for that data? Where is the data on boys? Point me to one peer reviewed study that shows that cervical cancer cases or cervical cancer deaths have been reduced due to the vaccine? Unfortunately, these studies are not done before the product goes to market. Serious adverse events are not tracked over any reasonable length of time before the product goes to market. All of this is done later, and our children are the experiments.
I believe this is the main reason that some parents have doubts about vaccinations, in general. It is because the information is sometimes suppressed and glossed over. It is not because of a celebrity such as Jenny McCarthy. If the CDC and others would be up-front and lay everything out on the table, and state exactly what is known, not known, or what is suspected, I believe there would be more compliance with vaccines. Instead they are afraid that the truth will lead to fewer vaccinations; when, it may very well increase compliance, as openness would lead to more trust.
At least parents should know about some of these stories of teenagers that experienced these adverse events. It is heartbreaking. Even if they are rare, we need to know about these girls and boys. They have a story to tell. Their lives have been devastated in their teenage and early adult years. If they had skipped the vaccine and later acquired cervical cancer, that typically hits much later in life, 40’s, 50’s and beyond.
Parent
March 19th, 2013
6:10 pm
“I don’t know where you got your figures”
The CDC website. I trust it more than Jennymccarthy.com.
Parent
March 19th, 2013
6:12 pm
Ann, apparently you think the CDC is conducting a massive coverup.
Old school
March 19th, 2013
8:34 pm
@Parent – You come across like an angry activist, perhaps on the payroll of the pharma that provides the vaccine in question, or maybe on the payroll of the CDC. Are you either, all or any? Can you do your job without anger? (angry rant coming in 1 . . .2 . . .3. . . )
Ann
March 19th, 2013
8:49 pm
@ Parent – Check out the report issued by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) entitled “CDC’s Ethics Program for Special Governmental Employees on Federal Advisory Committees”. The conflicts of interest among the CDC’s vaccine advisory committee members have been well documented and are easily verified with a little research. The report concluded that additional controls needed to be implemented to prevent future abuses. Many advisors have financial ties to vaccine manufacturers.
When millions and, sometimes, billions of dollars are at stake, history has shown the incentive to cover things up is great. Afterall, Merck, one of the vaccine manufacturers, is the company that court documents show maintained a “hit list” of doctors to be “neutralized” for speaking out against Vioxx. The industry comes down very hard on doctors who speak out and raise criticisms.
Read as much as you can about the pros and cons and decide what is best for your son or daughter. There are so many things that raise questions that need to be explored. For example, the research phase trials of Gardasil leading up to approval were all done on girls age 15 and up, yet it is recommended for girls as young as 11. For the age 11 group, it will be at least 25 years before we learn whether it was effective at lowering cervical cancer rate. The marketing claims also may lead people to be complacent and believe they are “protected”, when the vaccine wears off within 5 years, and may potentially lead to an increase in cervical cancer rates.
Btill
March 19th, 2013
9:53 pm
I had my son get the HPV shot today now he is complaining of being very hot. Fast heart beat and a stomach ache! Is there any idea is this is something I should worry about. I dont want to over react
Realist
March 19th, 2013
9:58 pm
I find it so interesting that so many would criticize the efforts of people with NO financial stake in the matter who are trying to wake people up to the documented side effects of this vaccine while they get every bit of their information from their doctor (who makes money off the vaccine and is likely paid by the pharmaceutical companies for his support), the CDC which, like the FDA, is just a giant revolving door for pharmaceutical company employees, and the companies themselves. Qui bono – who benefits? It is especially shocking given the potential harm, and that these are your own children.
Here is the most visited alternative medicine site on the web and what they have to say. The author is an MD by the way.
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/10/16/unproven-hpv-vaccine-safety.aspx
Realist
March 19th, 2013
10:02 pm
Btill – vaccines are full of very harmful chemicals that are directly injected into the body with no opportunity for the normal parts of the immune system (found in the gut, the intestines, the intestinal walls, etc.) to respond. Your son is either reacting poorly to one of these chemicals or is suffering from the normal attack on his immune system that vaccines cause. He could also be experiencing the damage to his immune system that vaccines also induce via the mercury, egg, shark-extract, aluminum, or other chemicals they generally contain.
Your doctor and the traditional medical establishment will deny all of this of course.
HB
March 19th, 2013
10:21 pm
I haven’t done the research myself, but I certainly don’t trust any “facts” presented by someone who doesn’t understand the difference between 6% of reactions and 6% of vaccinated patients. The difference between those two figures is huge!
The CDC site (which is where the 6% figure you cited came from) said there have been over 9,000 reported adverse effects among I think 16 million vaccine recipients. So for ease of math, let’s go ahead and round that up to 10,000. That’s .000625% of folks having an adverse effect or 6 in 10,000. Heck, let’s go ahead and say half go unreported — that’s takes us up to 13 in 10,000. But only 6% of those 13 people (and that’s extra generous, since I think serious reactions are less likely to go unreported) have serious reactions. Again, for ease, let’s add a zero — 130 reactions in 100,000. Of those 130, roughly 8 in 100,000 would have serious reactions. Nowhere near the 6 in 100 you used as the basis of your argument that more people would have serious reactions than would ever get cervical cancer.
Ann
March 19th, 2013
10:33 pm
@ Parent – The CDC website where you got your figure of 32 deaths is referencing a study that looked at data between June 2006 and December 2008. That figure only covered those two and a half years, and is over four and a half years old. See: http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/Vaccines/HPV/jama.html
The current figure is now over 100 in the Vaccine Adverse Reporting System. While death reports around the time of vaccination do not necessarily prove a connection, it raises a red flag to be investigated thoroughly.
HB
March 19th, 2013
10:49 pm
Yes, they should absolutely be investigated. But keep in mind, the increase in reported deaths near time of vaccine does not equal an increase in frequency. 32 and >100 mean nothing unless compared with number of people having received the vaccine at the time that those are the stats. As more vaccines are given, all numbers will go up — more people will experience adverse reactions, more will die, and more will be just fine. Percentage of serious adverse reactions held steady at 6% of all reactions.
Ann
March 19th, 2013
10:57 pm
@HB – Where is this 9000 figure you are getting? Over a year ago, it was over 25,000 (with over 900 reports of persons becoming disabled). Can you give the web site where you got this 9000 figure so we can see what year that data is from or what time period? The CDC and VAERS database lists a much higher number. In addition, you misread my post. The 6 in 10 was not the basis of my argument that more people would have serious reactions than would ever get cervical cancer. That is a separate quote directly from Dr. Diane Harper, one of the lead developers of the vaccine. If you re-read my post, it is her argument, not mine. Look her up and you will find some interesting dialogue that is food for thought. In the haste of reading, I did misread the person’s earlier post referencing the 6 in 10; regardless, 6% of adverse reports being serious is still a lot of children, especially considering the known “underreporting” to the database. It has been estimated that between 1 and 10 percent of events are reported, so the numbers may be much higher.
HB
March 19th, 2013
11:09 pm
I saw it earlier today on a CDC page that must have been older, but it had the same 6% figure for serious reactions among adverse reactions. 25,000 with how many total vaccines given?
HB
March 19th, 2013
11:13 pm
Found it – it was ATL Born and Raised’s link and the figure was from 2008.
HB
March 19th, 2013
11:28 pm
Is 6% of reactions being serious a high rate? What is a “normal” rate? And yes, no doubt, reactions are underreported, but nonserious reactions that do not require medical attention are less likely to be reported than serious ones. The data from 2008 (June in my link, Dec in yours, but similar %) is 3 or 4 serious reactions per 100,000 vaccines (I rounded up a lot and assumed a high number of unreported cases to get to 8). That doesn’t sound high to me.
Ann
March 19th, 2013
11:44 pm
There is a lot of useful information in this article on an interview with Dr. Harper, where she provided detailed written responses. She oversaw the clinical trials and is an expert on HPV. She outlines, in a concise bullet point list, the benefits and harms of pap screening and the benefits and harms of the vaccine. And, she also outlines suggestions for further research and ways to improve the Adverse event tracking. The article is from a few years ago, but there is so much helpful information packed into it and it gives a good overview of the issues from her perspective.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marcia-g-yerman/an-interview-with-dr-dian_b_405472.html
Ann
March 19th, 2013
11:53 pm
One of the things Dr. Harper writes about is having a better system of tracking what exactly happens “healthwise” with kids after receiving vaccinations. It seems logical to think that serious reactions would be reported more often than minor ones, but parents do not always “connect the dots”. Families experiencing the death of a child do not always have money for an autopsy to evaluate brain tissue or other factors. Unfortunately, investigations are quite limited in many cases.
Ann
March 20th, 2013
12:14 am
The incidence of new cases of cervical cancer in the United States is 7 per 100,000 women. Cervical cancer deaths decreased by approximately 74% in the last 50 years, largely due to Pap screening.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
5:38 am
“The incidence of new cases of cervical cancer in the United States is 7 per 100,000 women”
PER YEAR. Don’t forget that.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
5:45 am
“vaccines are full of very harmful chemicals that are directly injected into the body with no opportunity for the normal parts of the immune system (found in the gut, the intestines, the intestinal walls, etc.) to respond. Your son is either reacting poorly to one of these chemicals or is suffering from the normal attack on his immune system that vaccines cause. He could also be experiencing the damage to his immune system that vaccines also induce via the mercury, egg, shark-extract, aluminum, or other chemicals they generally contain.
Your doctor and the traditional medical establishment will deny all of this of course.”
If you believe that, then you should just let your son/daughter be unprotected until they become 18 – then they can make up their own mind. But God help them if they contract HPV and cancer that could have been prevented. People that deal with other cancers WISH there was a vaccine to prevent them.
By the way – that 7 in 100,000 translates to 12000 women being diagnosed EACH YEAR with cervical cancer. About 4000 women DIE each year from cervical cancer. So much for the theory that pap smears PREVENT all cervical cancer.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
5:46 am
“Families experiencing the death of a child do not always have money for an autopsy to evaluate brain tissue or other factors.”
My understanding that in ANY death where the cause is not obvious, the State requires an autopsy.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
6:55 am
” He could also be experiencing the damage to his immune system that vaccines also induce via the mercury, egg, shark-extract, aluminum, or other chemicals they generally contain”
Don’t forget the eye of newt and the wing of bat.
Ann
March 20th, 2013
9:54 am
@ Parent, Regarding “About 4000 women DIE each year from cervical cancer. So much for the theory that pap smears PREVENT all cervical cancer.” Your comments would be more helpful if you had data that showed how many of these women had routine, regular pap smears. There are far, too many women that do not keep up with regular appointments. There is a higher incidence of cervical cancer in the Hispanic population, for example. While there are some unfortunate cases of cancer in women who did receive regular exams, and some particularly agressive cancers that don’t respond to treatment, pap smears have resulted in a huge reduction in cervical cancer. We have decades of data that already prove that. I have a good friend who died of cervical cancer and frankly, she did not start out with the “best doctor” in the early years of her diagnosis. That can make a huge difference, as well.
Ann
March 20th, 2013
10:01 am
@ Parent – see the following comments from
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2011-05-02/national/35233246_1_cervical-cancer-pap-smears
“In most cases, women who get cervical cancer in this country are those who did not get a Pap smear,” said Robert Hilgers, a gynecologic oncologist in Kentucky, one of the states with the highest incidence of cervical cancer.”
“Hilgers and other doctors say cervical cancer is highly correlated with poverty and a lack of health insurance. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cites disproportionate levels of cervical cancer among the uninsured and underinsured.”
“For instance, in the Appalachian region of Kentucky, where the poverty rate was 24.5 percent in 2005-2009 — compared with the national rate of 13.5 percent — women get cervical cancer at a rate that is one-third higher than the national rate, and they die at a rate that is 37 percent higher, according to statistics from the Kentucky cancer registry and the National Cancer Institute.”
Parent
March 20th, 2013
10:45 am
Ann – agreed that NOT getting a pap smear done can more readily result in dying from cervical cancer. And I read Dr. Harper’s insistence that getting a HPV vaccine does NOT alleviate the need for pap testing. I agree that pap testing is invaluable in helping diagnose early cervical cancer. I don’t know how many of those 4000 each year had also had regular annual pap testing.
I also agree that people should be informed about the risk of vaccines. My opinion is that the best way to be informed is to talk to your pediatrician or your gynecologist. If you don’t trust your doctor, you should change doctors. Don’t trust the internet, that is for SURE.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
10:54 am
As a side note, my former wife had mammograms every year. One showed no breast cancer, the next showed a 2.0 cm lump. Anything less than 2.5 is “early detection”. According to the statistics, there is a 95% survival rate for “early detection”. Unfortunately, they don’t define “survival” – they were talking about “5-year suvival rate”. Well my wife did live 5 years (actually 6.5 years). If you look at “10-year survival rate”, you get 50%.
That is why I am so adamant about taking advantage of a vaccine that could help PREVENT the infection that can cause cervical cancer.
Ann
March 20th, 2013
12:57 pm
@ Parent – Sorry for your former wife. I have witnessed a relative in a similar situation. Unfortunately, mammograms, while they can often be life saving, do not quite have as good a track record as pap smears. There has been a lot of debate in recent years about mammograms, how often you should have them, radiation exposure risks, problems with early detection that leads to biopsies and treatments (sometimes for cancers that would have never grown to the extent of causing problems during the person’s lifetime). Then, those chemotherapy treatments that might not have been necessary wreak their own havoc on the body and can cause vulnerability that leads to pneumonia and other life threatening situations.
I do hope that we can one day have vaccines that will prevent all cancers. They need to be thoroughly tested on all age groups and genders, with any safety issues tracked and studied. This does take time. I do fear that many who get the vaccine at a young age will not go back every few years for repeat doses. It will wear off and they will not realize they are no longer protected. The experts do not have any concrete idea yet of how long the vaccine lasts. Time will tell how this HPV vaccine works out. Hopefully, for the benefit of our children, the results will be good. Discussion of risks and problems does help keep pressure on pharmaceutical companies to be on their toes, as some drugs are “fast tracked” and revoked years later. We have seen that recently with several major drugs for heart disease.
Ann
March 20th, 2013
1:16 pm
While your doctors should always be one of your main sources of information, the Internet can absolutely be a valuable tool for patients and families. There is a lot of bad information on the Web, but there is also a lot of great information. There is a lot of stuff from respected medical sources. It helps patients and families know what questions to ask about at appointments.
You have to sift through it and consider the source, and read enough varying articles to get a broad enough perspective. For example, I recently had my first colonoscopy procedure. The first doctor I was referred to (by my Primary Care physician), I went for a consultation and I was given the “prep” instructions to follow before the procedure. I went home and did a little reading on the Internet and saw an article talking about “split dosing” prep (where you drink your solutions in 2 different phases instead one one) and research has shown this is better for detecting cancer. I was not given the split dosing instructions. I called the doctor’s office to inquire about it and was told that some patients don’t like waking up during the night to drink the second dose and sometime the copayment can be more ($50). They said they offered it as an option, but I was puzzled as to why I was not given a choice at the time of my appointment. You only get a colonoscopy every 5-10 years. Waking up at 4:00 am once a decade is not a big deal if it helps detect cancer better. I switched doctors and found a place that did the split dosing as a matter of routine. I would not have known about the split dosing if I had not done my own reading on the Internet.
Doctors, while most are well meaning, are busy, they don’t always keep up with the cutting edge or have time to, and they sometimes “prescribe” (and give samples) of the products that sales reps give them. You need to be a partner in your own care and come in prepared with good questions for your doctor when it is an important matter.
Parent
March 20th, 2013
6:30 pm
Thanks, Ann.
Why are parents so leery of the HPV vaccine? – Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog)
March 20th, 2013
8:19 pm
[...] Why are parents so leery of the HPV vaccine?Atlanta Journal Constitution (blog)“Concerns about safety and side effects for the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine — one of the newest shots recommended for adolescents — has increased among parents: 16% cited these fears as the main reason they did not have their daughters … [...]