Last updated on September 27th, 2020 at 11:10 am
The first cancer prevention vaccine was administered in Australia exactly 10 years ago. Since that day, the HPV cancer prevention vaccine as been sold in 130 countries across the world. As a result, HPV vaccine effectiveness has been so high, that the rate of cervical pre-cancerous lesions has been cut in half.
This should be celebrated. As I’ve said at least a few times, the ways to reduce your actual cancer risk is limited. And it does not include drinking a kale-blueberry shake every morning. The real ways to reduce your risk of cancer can be as easy as staying out of the sun to stopping smoking. But the HPV vaccine is one of the most critical tools in the “war on cancer.”
Let’s take a look at the HPV cancer prevention vaccine and how effective it actually has been on cervical cancer.
All about HPV
I know I’ve written these paragraphs at least 50 times, but for the first time researcher, hopefully this helps. If you’ve read it before, skip this section. You can take a swig of coffee while scrolling down.
Genital human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) in the USA. There are more than 150 strains or subtypes of HPV sub-types that can infect humans. About 40 of these strains are linked to a variety of cancers.
Additionally, some HPV types can also infect the mouth and throat. HPV is generally transmitted from personal contact during vaginal, anal or oral sex.
Gardasil-9, the current version of the HPV cancer vaccine, protects teens and young adults from 9 subtypes of cancer-causing HPV, which leads to lower risks of more types of cancer.
Although the early symptoms of HPV infections aren’t serious, those infections are closely linked to many types of cancers in men and women. According to current medical research, here are some of the cancers that are linked to HPV:
These are all dangerous and disfiguring cancers that can be mostly prevented by the HPV cancer vaccine. If you’re a male, and you think that these are mostly female cancers, penile cancer can lead to amputation of your penis. Just think about that guys.
HPV is believed to cause nearly 5% of all new cancers across the world, making it almost as dangerous as tobacco with respect to cancer. According to the CDC, roughly 79 million Americans are infected with HPV–approximately 14 million Americans contract HPV every year. Most individuals don’t even know they have the infection until the onset of cancer. About 27,000 HPV-related cancers are diagnosed in the USA every year.
HPV vaccine effectiveness – cutting cancer rates
One of the top HPV related cancer researchers, Dr. Ian Frazer of Australia’s Translational Research Institute, has recently stated that HPV infections have dropped by 90% in the 10 years since HPV vaccinations commenced in Australia. He also states that since 170 million doses of the vaccine have been used worldwide since 2006, the worldwide rate of pre-cancerous lesions in the cervix has been halved.
Dr. Frazer also pointed out the low uptake of the HPV vaccine in the USA. He said:
[infobox icon=”quote-left”]In countries like the US where the vaccine isn’t so widely taken up, that’s a little bit disappointing because cervical cancer still kills several thousand women in the US.
Then, of course, we’ve got the problem of the 250,000 people that die from cervical cancer in the developing world.[/infobox]
Moreover, Dr. Frazer reminded everyone that the first vaccine, released 10 years ago, just protected against 2 strains of the HPV virus. Today, the Gardasil cancer prevention vaccine protects against 9 strains, further blocking transmission of the dangerous virus.
Researchers are continuing to identify the most dangerous strains of the human papillomavirus, and they will probably be added to the vaccine. One can only imagine how far the incidence of HPV-related will fall in another 10 years.
You can listen to the anti-vaccination myths and decide to not vaccinate yourself and your children against HPV. Or you can listen to real experts who provide us with evidence that the HPV vaccine effectiveness is so powerful that it’s reduced actual cancer rates. Your choice, but maybe you should listen to real scientists.
Gardasil prevents cancer and saves lives. It’s that simple people.
