Why are 44 percent of parents unwilling to give their daughters the HPV vaccine?
The vaccine has been proven effective in preventing the human papillomavirus (HPV), yet almost half of all parents still refuse to let their daughters get the vaccine.
New research published Monday in the journal “Pediatrics” studied why these parents still refuse to get their daughters vaccinated. What they found was troubling. The number of HPV vaccine-wary parents is growing. In 2010, 40 percent of parents claimed they didn’t plan on vaccinating their daughters, and 75 percent of teenage girls were not up to date on the vaccine. And despite more doctors recommending that girls get vaccinated, that number is growing.
The Atlantic points out a few important things about the vaccine:
-12,357 women in the United States were diagnosed with cervical cancer in 2009, and 3909 died of it.
-Most cervical cancer is caused by human papillomavirus (HPV).
-In 2006, the FDA approved a vaccination against HPV that can prevent some of said cervical cancer
-The CDC and American Academy of Pediatrics recommend the vaccine to all teenagers. Not studies have proven or raised serious questions about any associated side effects.
So why aren’t parents making the easy decision to vaccinate their daughters against HPV?
What the study revealed was that much of the reluctance to vaccinate comes from misinformation. The analysis, led by Dr. Paul Darden of the American Academy of Pediatrics, found that 11.1 percent of those parents surveyed felt that the vaccine was unnecessary because their child was “not sexually active.” And another 4.4 percent believed their daughters were not at an “appropriate age” to receive a vaccination for an STI.
But this combined 15 percent shows a common misconception about the HPV vaccine, that you don’t need it if you’re not sexually active. In fact, the vaccine is most effective when administered before the patient becomes sexually active. This statistic also shows the often very false belief that parents know when their children become sexually active.
What’s worse is the 16.4 percent of respondents who cited “Safety concerns/side effects” as their reason not to vaccinate (with a vaccine that has no known side effects), a number that has tripled between 2008 and 2010. The subjects in the study did not explain the reasoning behind their choice.
One solution to this “mother knows best” problem is waiving parental consent for the vaccine, like the UK did in 2010. But as a University of Michigan study found in July 2012, only 45 percent of American adults are in favor of waiving parental consent.
