vasculitis

This article about Jessica Ericzon was written by Dorit Rubinstein Reiss, Professor of Law at the University of California Hastings College of the Law (San Francisco, CA), who is a frequent contributor to this and many other blogs, providing in-depth, and intellectually stimulating, articles about vaccines, medical issues, social policy, and the law.

Professor Reiss writes extensively in law journals about the social and legal policies of vaccination. Additionally, Reiss is also a member of the Parent Advisory Board of Voices for Vaccines, a parent-led organization that supports and advocates for on-time vaccination and the reduction of vaccine-preventable disease. She is also a member of the Vaccines Working Group on Ethics and Policy.

This post revisits another sad, sad tragedy, the death of Jessica Ericzon, which was blamed on vaccines – this time, Gardasil, the vaccine that prevents infection with high-risk strains of HPV. Once again, the claim has no real evidence behind it. The concern, of course, is that these stories will lead to parents who are not already anti-vaccine refusing to protect their children against an infection that causes cancer.

Not protecting children against HPV infections that kill thousands and cause tens of thousands of cancer each year is putting them at unnecessary risk and setting the stage up for preventable tragedies. Doing it because of a painful death that no good evidence links to the vaccine, is doubly tragic. However painful, we owe it to future victims of preventable HPV cancers to set the facts straight.