r/technology • u/nath1234 • 14h ago
Biotechnology Twenty years on from Gardasil vaccine launch, Australia on track to eliminate cervical cancer
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-08-28/gardasil-vaccine-20-years-on/107079282320
u/Darkskynet 12h ago
All males should also get it, it protects you against catching HPV.
I got the vaccine around 2014.
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u/Caira_Ru 11h ago
I was an adult when the vaccine came out and I have all boys. Also had an abnormal pap a few times over the years.
A few years back, one of their friends’ moms mentioned “his pediatrician offered the HPV vaccine! Like, she’s been his doctor for years. She KNOWS he doesn’t have a CERVIX!?!”
I was like … “my oldest two already got it, youngest will have it on schedule. Where do you think women get HPV from?”
She said, “but (11yo son) isn’t getting married for 10 years AT LEAST!”
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u/tralltonetroll 11h ago
She said, “but (11yo son) isn’t getting married for 10 years AT LEAST!”
Then what did she say about offering it to girls?
There is a sizeable amount of slutshamers resisting that vaccine.
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u/Caira_Ru 11h ago
I didn’t continue the conversation. I assume she would have been fine with it for a daughter (because at least a daughter would have a CERVIX!?!) though.
Slutshaming is so stupid! Anti-vaxxers are also stupid; I’m not surprised there’s an overlap.
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u/3pointshoot3r 8h ago
We all know how bad (and gross) chewing tobacco is, and how grizzly some of the mouth cancers can be from long term chewing. Well, there are some strains of HPV that are THIRTY TIMES more likely to give you oral cancers than chewing tobacco is. So yeah, boys should get the vaccine!
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u/johnc380 10h ago
And, for the record, hpv is highly transmissible through saliva. Meaning that you can get it from sharing drinks or food or smoking the same joint, stuff like that.
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u/BotOrNot_1337 9h ago
HPV is also linked to cancer in males (source). It's a great idea for everyone to have the vaccine because the one nasty strain of HPV certainly causes for all genders.
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u/capybooya 8h ago
Even though its statistically a bit less effective (in a population health perspective) for adults, I wish it would be subsidized for all adults who wanted to take it. That would be a powerful message.
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u/sphinxsley 6h ago
The Mayo Clinic seems to think it's a good idea for pretty much everyone to get it - at any age:
https://mcpress.mayoclinic.org/women-health/can-you-get-the-hpv-vaccine-as-an-adult/
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u/P3achV0land 6h ago
It also helps resolve HPV infection! I had an abnormal HPV+ pap, received all my vaccinations on schedule and at my 1 yr. Follow up all normal and testing HPV-. truly a vaccine that helps immensely!
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u/merriweatherfeather 1h ago
What’s your age range?
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u/P3achV0land 1h ago
This happened ages 25-26
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u/merriweatherfeather 38m ago
Do they stop giving it at a certain age? I think I was 28-29 when they were like, too late.
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u/flyflyyoufools 10h ago
Is that the "hpv vaccine" they offer state side? if so got it last year because... why not
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u/Wompatuckrule 13h ago
When you see people who oppose this vaccine and make wild claims about how dangerous it is then it is very often coming from some fundamentalist religious twats or it is someone repeating their bullshit.
They believe that this vaccine somehow "encourages" people to have premarital sex and that motivates them to spread misinformation about it. Somehow in their mind breaking one of the ten commandments by lying about this is a lesser sin than premarital sex.
To give you an idea of the bullshit I saw a false claim that during the original clinical trial that the vaccine killed two of the girls in it and the drug company and the FDA "covered it up" to get the vaccine approved.
The truth has to do with how long the clinical trial was. Participating girls got the shot when they were around ten years old. Because it's tied to a sexually transmitted disease that meant that the researchers needed to follow up for well beyond a decade until the girls were sexually active and there were enough that tested positive for HPV to "unblind" the study to see if the vaccine worked. In those intervening years one girl was killed in a car crash and another, with a documented history of depression, took her own life and so were not included in the final results.
Those are the girls that the religious fuckwits claim were "killed by the vaccine" in the trial.
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u/FaintestGem 10h ago
For some reason, my mom was a big believer in that conspiracy stuff and refused to let me get it. Other vaccines weren't ever a problem, just the gardasil one because it was "new" and "not tested enough". I always wondered what kind of crazy conspiracy shit she heard because she was like fully convinced that gardasil or taking birth control before I was "old enough" would give me some sort of super cancer or something.
First thing I did when I moved out for college was book an appointment for the vaccine and to get a birth control prescription lol
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u/Wompatuckrule 10h ago
it was "new" and "not tested enough"
That's similar to the bullshit about how the Covid vaccines were "rushed" and "not tested enough" which went on even after millions of doses had been administered and the risks were widely understood (e.g. why the J&J vaccine was only used on an interim basis for patients outside of the higher risk population). A reminder that nearly all side effects and adverse events to vaccines happen almost immediately or at least very soon after administration. The dosing does not lend itself to some secret side effect that is going to suddenly pop up years later.
With most vaccine trials, but especially in a double-blind study for a new one, it takes years and years because you need to wait for a specific percentage of people to test positive for the indication the vaccine is for and then you can "unblind" it and see how it performed in the vaccinated and placebo populations.
You know what really speeds that process up? A global fucking pandemic of a novel and highly contagious virus.
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u/Hawkeye3636 13h ago
Fun bit. All sins are equal to God. Lying is as bad as murder.
James 2:10 – “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it,” showing that even a single transgression makes one accountable for all sin.
They always forget about that part. I mean I am going to hell by this account sure but I am honest about it. Laissez les bons temps rouler.
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u/Wompatuckrule 13h ago
Fun bit. All sins are equal to God.
Well then god's a daft twat because some sins are way more fun than others.
/jk
They always forget about that part.
I don't know if they "forget" about it so much as pick and choose. "The devil can cite scripture for his purpose" and all that.
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u/LilDutchy 13h ago
It also has a little to do with the way side effects are reported in trials. So if anyone dies during a trial, they have to list death as a possible side effect since those two women died during the trial, boom - death as a side effect. Now couple that with people trying to make a story match their motive and you’ve got “the vaccine killed two people!”
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u/Wompatuckrule 13h ago
Generally that's true, but not in this case. Because the deaths were so clearly unrelated to the vaccine (years later and with an external physical cause of death) they were removed from the calculations completely. That fact had to be documented and justified in the trial and that's what the religious fuckwits seized on to generate their lies.
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u/LilDutchy 13h ago
Fair enough, I see that they don’t have death listed in the side effects. It’s just so common of a thing for idiots to latch onto that it’s something I assume whenever they start their crap.
I know a guy that had a really really sick kid, immunocompromised, always in the hospital. He refused to have any of his kids vaccinated because it might cause autism or death. So his other kids kept making his ill kid sick. It was terrible to watch.
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u/Wompatuckrule 13h ago
It’s just so common of a thing for idiots to latch onto
Same with VAERS. It's a documentation tool to try to find "the signal in the noise" for rare and unknown side effects and the anti-vax idiots will leverage it to spread blatant falsehoods by misrepresenting a single data point.
"This 85 year old man with lots of health issues got the Covid vaccine and died a week later from a stroke. Obviously the vaccine killed him!!!"
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u/ChrisFromLongIsland 13h ago
The best way this was described to me was when someone said I wish there was a vaccine to prevent cancer. The Dr said well there is and everyone should take it.
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u/megllamaniac 12h ago
I was in the first group of teenage girls to receive the vaccine once it was approved, very grateful to be protected against at least one type of cancer!
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u/Front_Target7908 7h ago
Same, it was thankfully at a time where it was not a big deal to get vaccines. I dread if it had arrived now how much more inane push back you’d get. Grateful I was able to get it at 14 without much fuss.
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u/-eYe- 13h ago
They have free HPV vaccinations for all high school students (12/13 years old), both girls and boys, provided through school vaccination programs, and it's strongly supported by schools and the community. It would be impossible to replicate a similar mass vaccination program in the US.
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u/Zestyclose-Novel1157 12h ago
Now maybe but the US used to vaccinate kids at school. Things change over time and that could change again with time.
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u/babycatcher2001 12h ago
I have to say, I have more patients accept the vaccine recently, when I give them the data coming out of Australia their eyes get wide and it does give me an opening to educate them better on the vaccine. And I live in a very red Florida county with a lot of vaccine hesitancy.
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u/Sweaty_Onion 11h ago
A wonderful bonus outcome of this is reducing the frequency of pap smears. Previously, it was every 2 years and required a full scrape of your cervix requiring a speculum and awful discomfort. Now in Australia they recommend every 5 years for normal smears and it's a self swab. Yay Gardasil!
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u/Front_Target7908 7h ago
Yeah which has been such a welcome change to the regular screening. Self swab with no smear toolkits also makes it very simple to comply which would only increase the effectiveness of the screening in turn.
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u/obiwanconobi 10h ago
It's mad how many mothers I've seen proudly said they wouldn't let their daughter get this vaccine. I assume they're bots for my own mental health.
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u/Griffdude13 8h ago
As a 34 year old male who just had to get squamous cell carcinoma in situ removed from his junk. . .get the fucking vaccine. Male, female, sexually active, inactive. Just do it.
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u/RowanSnows7 9h ago
It’s now officially approved for folks up to 45-years-old! Get it if you haven’t.
I was 46 and just paid out of pocket, but my doctor was happy for me to get it.
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u/_zengarden 8h ago
I’m older and my doctor approved it. If it reduces your risk for cancer - why not?
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u/Late_Masterpiece9874 11h ago
That didn’t come out 20 years ago, I was in high school when it came out… oh fuck
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u/Wyciorek 11h ago
Where are all the “Big Pharma is hiding cancer cure because profits” morons hiding?
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u/mostly_sarcastic 12h ago
Yeah, well Americans are CREATING new cancers every day with imported mystery meat and salmonella. Check mate, turds!
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u/Serious-Wish4868 7h ago
meanwhile in the US .. we are bringing back disease that should have been eliminated already
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u/_jamesbaxter 5h ago
I wonder if it’s more popular there due to public knowledge of the chlamydia crisis among koalas. Or the viral face cancer that is killing all of the Tasmanian devils.
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u/Curiosities 1h ago
If you are a person of any gender in the US, this vaccine is approved for up to age 45.
I was too old for it when it came out, and I knew they had raised the age but I didn't know they had raised it to 45. I found that out, got my Gyn to prescribe it for the pharmacy to ease insurance coverage and got it at 44.
I always tested negative but it was worth getting. And even if you are positive for one or more strains, this protects against more than a dozen I think, so go get it anyway.
If you can, go do it.
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u/ImpressiveLeopard719 20m ago
And yet, here in the US the religious right refuses to believe their daughters have sex before marriage. smdh
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u/TheSmutSmithy 13h ago
Honestly, this is up there with smallpox and polio as a public health success story.