The medical community has criticized the government’s policy plan to expand the national HPV vaccination support project’s focus to boys, but supports only one vaccination out of a total of two or three, as in the UK and Australia, calling it political ineffective. Photo source = Getty Images
As it was reported that the government was considering extending the scope of the national HPV (human papillomavirus) vaccination support project to 12-year-olds, but providing free support for only one of the two or three total vaccinations , as was the case in the UK and Australia, the medical community said it would be effective, but there was criticism that it was a policy that didn’t exist.
According to the medical community, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency is considering a plan to include boys as young as 12 years old in the national support list for HPV vaccination, but would only support the first vaccination. Currently, the targets of the national HPV vaccination support project are adolescents aged between 12 and 17 and low-income women aged between 18 and 26. Those aged 12 to 14 years should be vaccinated twice at 6-12 month intervals, while those aged 15 to 26 years should be vaccinated twice at 6-12 month intervals. 26 will have to be vaccinated three times.
The Korean Association of Obstetrics and Gynecology Professionals, which involves direct voting, issued a statement on the 18th, saying, “If the government only supports one-dose vaccination, only financially well-off citizens will be able to receive additional vaccinations,” adding : “Research Results on the single-dose HPV vaccine are still inconsistent and he stressed: “It is necessary to verify the safety and effectiveness through further research results.”
The Medical Association stated: “To date, only the immunogenicity and prevention effects of HPV infection have been confirmed, and the definitive disease prevention effect has not been demonstrated. In particular, the reduction of precancerous lesions in cervical cancer, anal cancer, etc. it has not yet been tested,” he said, raising questions about the effectiveness of the policy of supporting single-dose vaccination.
The United Kingdom and Australia have changed their policies to only take the first dose of the HPV vaccine, but the situation is different from Korea, the medical association pointed out. The UK started a project to support HPV vaccination for both women and men in 2008 and Australia in 2006, so herd immunity has been sufficiently formed, but this is not the case in Korea.
According to the Medical Association, the cumulative HPV vaccination rate in Australia is 80.5% for women and 78.0% for men as of 2020, and in the United Kingdom, the average for men and women is 60-70% as of 2021. On the other hand, Korea has implemented the national HPV vaccination support project for women since 2016, and as of 2023, the cumulative vaccination rate will be only 43% for women women and 3% for men.
The Medical Association said: “It has only been 8 years since Korea started the national HPV vaccination project, and since it only targets girls, herd immunity has not yet been fully formed,” adding: “The efficacy is unclear and there is a risk of causing a public health imbalance.” “Rather than a half-baked project, I hope that a normal project in which the government supports all vaccinations will be implemented while ensuring an adequate budget,” he stressed.
2024-01-18 08:26:42
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