TIME TO GO OUT AND GET POKED

Alright, listen up kids. The fabled HPV vaccine is finally out. Merck, a pharmaceutical company, has been working on a new vaccine, called Gardasil, for a solid four years, and on June 8th of this summer, it got the nod of approval from the FDA.
There has been a huge push for some kind of preventative measure ( since even condoms don'’t protect people entirely) for HPV by health officials all over the country because they are freaked out by the sheer number of people infected. Twenty million people in the United States have it and HPV gets half of all sexually active women between the ages of 18 and 22. Look around the campus ladies, that's us.
An HPV infection can manifest in a couple of different ways. It can cause genital warts, which spreads to other people through skin-to-skin contact. The warts can be burned or lasered off, or you can wait for your body to fight the infection off naturally. Since HPV is a virus, your immune system can sometimes take care of it. In other cases, it stays in your system and causes sporadic outbreaks throughout your life. HPV (and this is what makes gynecologists really nervous) can also cause cancer in your cervix. The virus attaches itself to proteins in cervical cells and causes mutation, which is the cancer.
Gardasil works by going after four subgroups of HPV: the two strains that cause 90% of the genital warts, and the other two that cause 70% of cases cervical cancers. The whole thing is administered in a series of three shots over a period of six months, and is 100% effective against the targeted strains. We know the vaccine is good for four years, but scientists aren'’t sure about it'’s long-term effectiveness or the possible need for booster shots. Right now, they'’re doing what they do best and continue to test it.
Of course, there'’s a catch. This thing is not cheap, which puts broke college kids at kind of a disadvantage. Without insurance, the series of shots will cost three hundred and sixty dollars, which makes it the most expensive vaccine on the block. The Center for Disease Control, which pretty much dictates what health insurance will cover and what it won't, is strongly recommending the shots for girls between the ages of nine and twelve, and less adamantly for women ages thirteen to twenty-six. So, there's a possibility that we may get some coverage, but we might as easily be on our own. As of yet, the vaccine hasn'’t been picked up by private health insurance. If you don't have health insurace, there is a government project in the works to help offset the cost for families without health coverage.
Cost aside, it'’s important to get vaccinated as soon as you can. Gardasil isn'’t going to do you any good if you'’ve already been exposed to HPV, which is why health officials want to shoot fourth graders full of this stuff. So go over to the Wellness Center, or whatever gynecologist you want, make some awkward small talk while you get a pap smear, see if you're eligible to get the vaccine, and then, if you have the means, go get it done. Think of it as the most expensive and worthwhile flu shot you'’ll ever have.

Sidenote: a vaccine similar to Gardasil for men and boys is in the works. Another cervical cancer vaccine, called Ceravix, is due out by the end of 2006.

www.webmd.com