VANCOUVER -- In health news -- there will soon be a way to protect against cervical cancer -- through vaccines. As advisory committee to the U-S F-D-A is recommending the agency approve one of the vaccines -- which also protects against genital warts. Trials for the other vaccine are still underway -- with research being done right here in Vancouver.
Kelly Keitel is a vaccine trial participant. She says, "you don't think of cancers being caused by viruses."
Keitel is taking part in a trial to test a vaccine against two strains of the hpv or human papilloma virus, which are responsible for 70 percent of cervical cancer cases.
"I had a co-worker who had cervical cancer. She was 25 and she had to have a hysterectomy."
Dr. Deborah Money, Head Maternal Fetal Medicine at BC Children's Hospital, says, "this particular type of cancer of the cervix, looks like it's almost exclusively caused by a viral infection."
From two main types of hpv. The viruses are spread through sexual intercourse. Most of the time our immune system is able to clear the viruses, but in about 1300 Canadian women a year the infection develops into cancer.Although pap smears have helped reduce the number of deaths, cervical cancer remains the fifth most common cause of cancer death in women. Now vaccines may help prevent this type of cancer altogether.
Dr. Deborah Money, Fetal Maternal Medicine at BC Children's Hospital, says,"these vaccines are really quite remarkable, what they do is the seem to protect individuals from new infection with the particular strain that's in the vaccine."
The vaccine being tested at BC Children's Hospital is one of two in the regulatory pipeline for approval. One could get the green light for approval in the US within weeks. But across the border, there are some concerns about whether adolescent girls should be given the vaccine.
Dr. Money says, "essentially, what the Americans are worried about is that if you give the vaccine to a young adolescent girl, that will give her permission to engage in unsafe sex."
Most health experts and sex educators believe that won't be the case.
Sex Educator Alix Bacon says, "if there was a vaccine against HIV or HEP C, which are sexually transmitted diseases that kill, we wouldn't deny them to anyone. I mean there's no good giving it to someone after the fact. This way your children will be more protected if and when they choose to make a decision."
If the vaccines do make it to market, and are publicly funded, they may well be given to preteens as part of the school vaccination program.
Researchers are currently recruiting women 26 and older for the latest vaccine trial. For more information -- call 604-875-2424 extension 6359 or email HPVStudy@cw.bc.ca.
Friday May 19, 2006
