Japan Archives – Skeptical Raptor

2018/07/252018/07/25

Japan banned Gardasil – another ridiculous anti-vaccine myth

One of the most popular zombie memes and tropes of the anti-vaccine movement is that Japan banned Gardasil, the HPV vaccine. And like most of those zombie memes and tropes, the facts are a lot different than the anti-vaccine claims. Per usual.

Although I don’t quite understand the reasoning, the anti-vaccine religion absolutely hates Gardasil, possibly more than any other vaccine. These zealots maintain that the HPV vaccines cause all kinds of harm to teens and young adults. Yet, there are literally mountains of data derived from numerous huge epidemiological studies that the Gardasil cancer-preventing vaccine is one of the safest vaccines on the market.

So if you really want to prevent cancer, one of the best ways available to you is getting the HPV vaccine. The idea is so simple, yet is clouded by the myths about HPV vaccines – one of the most popular, of course, is that Japan banned Gardasil. Let’s examine this fable with a critical and skeptical eye.

Spoiler alert – Japan did no such thing.

Continue reading “Japan banned Gardasil – another ridiculous anti-vaccine myth”

2018/07/232018/07/23

Chinese vaccine scandal – not a concern for USA and many other countries

Recently, a Chinese vaccine scandal has been reported in many news sources. According to these reports, a Chinese vaccine manufacturer produced and marketed “low-quality” vaccines for infants. Moreover, they falsified production and inspection data on a rabies vaccine – as I’ve written before, rabies is a deadly disease, with almost 100% mortality after symptoms appear, and the vaccine is the only choice to save lives.

This is an appalling story on so many levels. Authorities in the country had lax enforcement and regulation of their vaccine industry – the government was attacked on social media about the situation, a rarity in a communist country where free speech is strictly limited. As a result, the Chinese government will begin regulating their vaccine manufacturers more closely, although it may be too little and too late.

On the other hand, Hong Kong utilizes mostly “Western” manufactured vaccines, which has led to many Chinese citizens going to that autonomous region to get their children vaccinated. There are websites devoted to showing how parents can avoid Chinese vaccines and get the “good stuff.”

These kinds of outrageous ethical lapses generally do not happen in the USA, Europe, Japan, Canada, Australia, and many other countries. Falsifying data can lead to severe criminal prosecution and civil penalties, something that is far beyond the response from Chinese authorities to this scandal.

Of course, this has led to one of the most ridiculous myths of the anti-vaccine world – our vaccines are dangerous because they were manufactured in China. Under most circumstances, this would be a laughable myth, but with this Chinese vaccine scandal, it’s important that we know where our vaccines are manufactured – spoiler alert, they are made in the USA, Europe, Canada, and Japan, all of which have strict regulation of the pharmaceutical industry. Continue reading “Chinese vaccine scandal – not a concern for USA and many other countries”

2018/05/13

HPV vaccine caused neurological damage? Journal retracts article

Stop me if you’ve heard this before – another anti-HPV vaccine paper gets retracted. Yeah, I’ve written about these retractions so many times (here, here, and here, and that’s just a sample), I could publish a book just about these “researchers.” And now we here about another anti-vaccine study, that was recently retracted, which claimed that the HPV vaccine caused neurological damages. This study heads to the dustbin of scientific research, as it deserves.

A mountain of high quality, robust clinical and epidemiological evidence has overwhelmingly established that the HPV vaccine is safe and effective. This is approaching the level of settled science.

With the retraction of the study that the HPV vaccine caused neurological damage, it’s clear that the anti-vaccine crowd has almost nothing to support their hatred of the vaccine. Not that it will stop them. Continue reading “HPV vaccine caused neurological damage? Journal retracts article”

2017/12/042017/12/04

Bananas prevent cancer – debunking another myth about food

I wrote an article about how to critically analyze pseudoscience and misinformation so that you might skeptically analyze evidence supporting a claim, even if it appeared to be accurate. On Facebook, Twitter and many internet sites (including Wikipedia), there is an amazing tendency of individuals to accept what is written as “the truth” without spending the effort to determine if what is written is based on accurate science.

But if you’re going to make an extraordinary claim, like bananas prevent cancer, you’re going to have to provide extraordinary evidence. And if you’re going to push a pseudoscientific claim, please read what you claim as evidence. Because we have a case here, where the evidence isn’t even in the same universe as the claims.

Continue reading “Bananas prevent cancer – debunking another myth about food”

2017/08/03

HPV vaccine safety study – biased, poor design and results

If you want to read a quality HPV vaccine safety study, I can point to numerous high quality, unbiased, well-designed epidemiological studies that show that HPV vaccines are safe and very effective.

Here’s a review of a study of 200,000 subjects.

Here’s a review of a study with over 1,000,000 subjects.

Here’s a review of a study with over 2,000,000 subjects.

If you want to give us a new HPV vaccine safety study, it better have large numbers (to identify small differences in risks), be unbiased, and use some sort of control group.

Continue reading “HPV vaccine safety study – biased, poor design and results”

2016/09/18

Japan HPV infection risk can be reduced with Gardasil

As I’ve written previously, the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare had suspended recommending the cancer preventing HPV vaccine as a result of the worst statistical analysis ever. Of course, Japanese lawyers, looking for a quick yen, has sued the manufacturers of the HPV vaccine, despite the utter lack of evidence. Unfortunately, there is a growing body of evidence that the Japan HPV infection risk can be reduced after the reinstitution of the recommending Gardasil for young girls in the country.

Continue reading “Japan HPV infection risk can be reduced with Gardasil”

2016/08/222016/10/03

HPV cancer vaccine rates – Gardasil uptake remains low

As I’ve written before, there are precious few ways to prevent cancer. But one of the best cancer prevention strategies is the HPV vaccine, which can prevent numerous cancers such as cervical, oral, penile and anal, all serious, and all dangerous. Maybe we should just rename Gardasil to “HPV cancer vaccine,” which could make everyone sit up and notice.

The HPV vaccination rate remains depressingly low in the USA. According to recent research, 39.7% of adolescent girls aged 13-17 received all three doses of the vaccine in 2014 up from 37.6% in 2013. HPV vaccination rates among teen boys are much lower than for girls, 21.6% in 2014 up from 13.4% in 2013.

There are probably a lot of reasons for the low HPV cancer vaccine uptake rate, so I thought I’d go through the most “popular” ones, debunking them one by one.

Hopefully, the reader can use this article as a checklist of the tropes and myths of the anti-Gardasil crowd with quick answers to them. Maybe you’ll convince one person to get their son or daughter vaccinated against HPV related cancers.

Continue reading “HPV cancer vaccine rates – Gardasil uptake remains low”

2016/07/14

Japanese HPV vaccine lawsuit – no science, no evidence

The HPV vaccine, specifically the Gardasil 9-valent version, is one of the handful of ways to actually prevent cancer. Along with the hepatitis-B vaccine, the HPV vaccine helps prevent future incidence of dangerous cancers. Unfortunately, a Japanese HPV vaccine lawsuit has been filed in that country by 64 women.

Gardasil has had a tumultuous history in Japan. The vaccine is no longer recommended for Japanese teens, based on an unscientific analysis of evidence related to adverse events. The Japanese Health Ministry accepted supposed “adverse events” after Gardasil vaccine as causal, even though the rate of these adverse events after vaccination was LOWER than the general non-vaccinated population. It was total incompetence on the part of the Health Ministry.

Let’s take a look at this lawsuit in Japan – and we need to see what it really means.

Continue reading “Japanese HPV vaccine lawsuit – no science, no evidence”

2015/11/112016/05/12

Updated – Japan and HPV vaccine – debunking myths

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in June 2013. It has been revised and updated to include recent developments with the HPV cancer preventing vaccine and Japan’s Health Ministry.

The comments have been closed for this article. Please comment at the revised article.

I enjoy refuting myths about cancer prevention and cures, for only one reason–because there are real cancer cures and preventions that people overlook. Frankly speaking, there really is only a handful of ways to prevent cancer backed by real scientific evidence–and one of the most important ones is receiving the HPV vaccine.

Genital human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) in the USA. There are more than 40 HPV sub-types that can infect the genital areas of males and females. Additionally, some HPV types can also infect the mouth and throat. HPV is generally transmitted from personal contact during vaginal, anal or oral sex.

HPV is linked to cancers in men and women, and because there are so many subtypes, research has established which HPV types are related to which cancers. Because HPV is sexually transmitted, most of the infections occur near the mouth, throat, anus and genital areas–and most HPV related cancers begin there.

HPV is believed to cause nearly 5% of all new cancers across the world, making it almost as dangerous with regards to cancer as tobacco. 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.

Continue reading “Updated – Japan and HPV vaccine – debunking myths”

2014/11/112014/11/11

Worldwide vaccine uptake-2014

I make it a point to update this blog with the most current CDC analysis of vaccine uptake in the USA for kindergarten children (usually around 5 years old). Generally, the numbers have stayed stable, at around 95% vaccinated, although there is high variance from state to state, and locality to locality. The weakness in the vaccination uptake in the USA is that some areas may approach 100% vaccinated, but then other areas may be 50%, which makes those areas with low vaccine uptake susceptible to a quick spread of diseases that are not endemic to the USA (such as measles, polio, and others) through that unvaccinated population.

Given the 95% vaccine uptake rate, it begs the questions of why I push so hard for vaccination–because I want to protect the lives of children, and those 5% who aren’t vaccinated are at risk of serious disease and even death. And vaccines are the safest way to protect a child–protect them from death.

Nearly 55% of the readers of this blog are not American (a couple of years ago,this blog got a regular reader from Iran, which meant that all countries were represented amongst this blog’s readers). I have been accused of being a bit American-centric, but at the same time, I was also curious about vaccine uptake worldwide. Continue reading “Worldwide vaccine uptake-2014”