Alberta joins other provinces in approving HPV vaccine for teens, young women

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Alberta joins other provinces in approving HPV vaccine for teens, young women

THE CANADIAN PRESS

12/06/2008 7:23:00 PM

EDMONTON - Alberta agreed Thursday to pay for the HPV vaccine for young girls to

help prevent cervical cancers, the last province in Canada to do so.

Doctors have been lobbying for more than a year for the HPV vaccine, but the

Conservative government appeared reluctant to do so out of fear that it would be

seen as condoning sex among young people.

" This voluntary immunization program is really about taking preventive action to

kee our female students healthy as they grow into young, successful adults, "

Education Minister Dave Hancock said in a news release.

Alberta parents will be given the option this fall of signing consent forms to

have their daughters immunized at school.

Girls in Grades 5 will be vaccinated beginning in September, while Grade 9 girls

will start in September 2009.

Three doses of the vaccine are required to achieve immunity from four types of

human papilloma virus, two of which cause 70 per cent of cervical cancers.

While the vaccine is licensed for use in girls and women aged nine to 26,

Alberta is only paying for girls in Grades 5 and 9. The others will have to

purchase the vaccine from their doctors if they want it.

The Canadian Immunization Committee and the Alberta advisory committee on

communicable disease recommended the vaccine be provided routinely to girls in

one grade between Grades 4 to 8. The Conservative government, however, also

chose to offer a catch-up program for Grade 9 girls.

About 180 women are diagnosed with cervical cancer in Alberta each year and 40

will die from the disease.

More than 20 million doses of Gardasil, the trademark name for the vaccine, have

been given worldwide, with few serious adverse reactions reported.

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