Michigan to Force HPV Vaccine on Little Girls

From The Toledo Blade, September 13, 2006
Michigan bills push cervical cancer vaccinations for 6th-grade girls

"Because the HPV vaccine prevents a sexually transmitted disease, some parents and religious groups across the country have expressed reservations about vaccinating young girls. Ms. Hammerstrom said that she thinks parents are responsible enough to tell their daughters what they feel is appropriate behavior. She pointed out that hepatitis B is a virus most commonly spread through sexual intercourse or sharing drug needles, but that it is also required. "

"I would want to more about it, if there are any side effects, how long the vaccine works, if you have to be revaccinated," said Mary Dunnett, the PTA president at Bedford Public School's Douglas Road Elementary School. "I would want to know more about it before they made it [law]."

"Ida Public Schools Superintendent Marv Dick said required vaccines are good reminders for parents, but added that he thinks parents should be able to decide whether their child receives a vaccine...."I think parents need to have some input as to what happens to their children," he said. " -Toledo Blade

Barbara Loe Fisher Commentary:

In 1991, the National Vaccine Information Center opposed the mandating of hepatitis B vaccine for school entry. Hepatitis B is a primarily adult disease transmitted through contact with infected blood during IV drug use and sexual contact. At the time, public health officials, pediatricians and drug company lobbyists persuaded state legislators to mandate hepatitis B vaccine for school entry because the CDC said infected kids could transmit the virus to other kids when they cut themselves and bled on other children or shared toothbrushes when they had open sores in their mouths. Now, the same forced vaccination lobbyists are persuading trusting but clueless legislators that mandating HPV vaccine for pre-adolescent girls in sixth grade will prevent cervical cancer when the girls become sexually active someday.

Why are the facts about HPV infection and cervical cancer being hidden from the public by forced vaccination lobbyists? Because acknowledging the facts about HPV won't get them more money or power.

The fact is that most sexually active women have encountered the HPV virus, naturally developed antibodies and cleared the infection from their body. A tiny minority of sexually active women go on to become chronically infected with HPV and, after many years, develop cervical cancer. Nearly 100 percent of all HPV associated cervical cancer can be identified through annual pap smears and prevented.

HPV associated cervical cancer deaths (4600 deaths annually) are way down on the list of leading cancer killers of women in America because annual pap smears have reduced cervical cancer deaths by more than 70 percent since the 1950's. The leading cancer killers of American women today are lung cancer (68,000 deaths annually); breast cancer (42,000 deaths); colorectal cancer (29,000 deaths); ovarian cancer (14,000 deaths); skin cancer (9600 deaths); and uterine cancer (6500 deaths). Although annual pap smears can prevent almost 100 percent of all cervical cancers, the forced vaccination lobbyists are trying to con thedia and the American public into believing they should force all 9 to 11 year old girls in America to get injected with three doses of HPV vaccine at a per child cost of $375 (not including the charge for the pediatrician's office visit) or be denied an education.

Mandating HPV vaccination for all young girls is nothing more than a boondoggle for drug companies selling vaccines and a national experiment on innocent children because there have been no long term studies to evaluate whether the HPV vaccine will cause autoimmune disorders in genetically vulnerable children (see NVIC's June 27, 2006 press release on HPV vaccine at www.nvic.org) Unfortunately, politicians have been persuaded to believe that introducing new vaccine mandates for school entry is a vote-getter. They do not realize that a growing number of voter parents justifiably view new vaccine mandates as another threat to the health and well being of their children, who are already chronically ill from too much vaccination.