My friend over at Shamelessly Atheist posted a story about a second Alberta School Board not supplying their students with the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine.
In this case it is the Calgary Catholic School Board. This is not a small backwater school board. It has approximately 44,000 students in 102 schools, and unlike the US it is publicly funded. For comparison, the public school board is approximately twice as big.
Calgary likes to tout itself as a world class city. It has a booming economy. It is one of the oil capitals of the world. It held the winter Olympics in 1988. It is appalling that one of its school boards would withhold a safe, free vaccine from its students.
This is a public health issue not a religious one. The argument that protecting against HPV will promote premarital sex is specious. The vaccine should be provided to all students. If individual parents want to opt out that is unfortunate but their decision.
The “it might lead to premarital sex” faction drives me nuts. If you are concerned about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), genital warts must be at the bottom of the list. Can you imagine a child saying I can’t have sex because I might get warts and maybe cervical cancer when I am really old and almost dead–You know around 40. Once I am vaccinated I am good to go.
Subscribe via RSS
Subscribe via Email
This is for grade 6 students, children who are approximately 12. They are not even teenagers yet. Of course the goal of vaccinating is to do so before any likely sexual activity.
The only reason that this vaccine is being withheld is it prevents a sexually transmitted disease. If you want to be cynical, a disease that is potentially fatal, only for women. While sexual activity is the known transmission mechanism, there appears to be growing evidence that this is not the only vector. Mother to child transmission is known to occur. HPV DNA has been found under the finger nails of infected individuals and on seats in humid environments such as showers. While I don’t want to join the “you can get STDs from a toilet seat” brigade. Are the parents who are confident that their children will not engage in intercourse, as confident that they will not be involved in milder sexual activities such as petting and mutual masturbation?
Calgary is one of Canada’s fastest growing cities, but the catholic school board is showing declining enrollment, while the public enrollment is projected to rise. For the students future health, lets hope this trend accelerates.
As for the children, they may eventually be concerned about AIDS, herpes, syphilis, hepatitis, and lice, but the lucky ones will not have to worry about getting warts. That makes sex soooo much less scary.