ATLANTA -- A government panel is recommending that young boys also get the controversial HPV shot. That's the vaccine now given to girls to prevent cervical cancer, which kills about 4 thousand women a year.
Doctors argue that it could protect boys against genital warts and some kinds of cancers. But they also say vaccinating 11- and 12-year old boys could also help prevent the spread of the sexually transmitted virus to girls.
There is a Syracuse connection to the recommendation from an advisory panel to the Centers for Disease Control. Dr. Leonard Weiner, the Director of Pediatric Infectious Disease at Upstate Golisano Hospital was among a group of leading medical experts whose research was considered by the CDC's panel. Weiner told CNY Central's Jim Kenyon that the vaccine is "highly effective not only in preventing cervical cancer and other genital cancers in women, and now the data that led to the recommendation in boys shows it's highly effecting in preventing genital cancers in males."
Dr. Weiner says it makes sense that boys and girls receive the vaccine before they become sexually active. "It's not a treatment vaccine, it's a preventative vaccine."
The HPV vaccine has been controversial since it was recommended for girls five years ago. And only about a third of adolescent girls have been fully vaccinated against the virus. Never the less, Dr. Weiner says that in 15 to 20 years the vaccine will become so common place, "there will no longer be a need for pap smears" for women.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices made the recommendation Tuesday. Federal health officials usually adopt what the panel says and asks doctors and patients to follow the recommendations.
Should boys get the HPV vaccine? Should girls get the shot? Why or why not? Will your children get it?
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
