HPV vaccination programme extended

The Department of Health has announced an extension of the HPV vaccination programme, with 300,000 more girls to be offered the vaccine against cervical cancer.

This extension will start in September and be provided to girls aged 17-18 and is in addition to the routine vaccination of 12-13-year-old girls beginning in the same month.

Provision of these additional doses of the Cervarix vaccine from GlaxoSmithKline have been made possible via savings made through the vaccine procurement process, the Department of Health said.

Furthermore, a two-year catch-up programme for girls aged 15-19 will begin in 2009-10.

Dawn Primarolo, public health minister, said: “Our policy to vaccinate girls against cervical cancer is one of the biggest public health campaigns in recent history.

“It will mean that up to 400 girls’ lives will be saved each year.”

She added the vaccine will protect against the two strains of the HPV virus that cause 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases.

Cervical cancer is the second-most common cause of cancer in women worldwide.

In October 2007, secretary of state for health Alan Johnson welcomed the recommendation that a HPV vaccination be included in the NHS immunisation programme.

He said society must do more to prevent, rather than just treat, disease.