'Completely unethical': Women excluded from life-saving vaccine in Scotland

[IwantToRetire]

Women in Scotland are being left at risk of a killer cancer because of the refusal to fund a preventative vaccine through the NHS, according to a leading medical ethicist.

Females aged 26-45 are currently excluded from the HPV vaccine which protects against cervical cancer and genital warts even though it is offered to men in high-risk groups in the same age category.

Yet women are most at risk for deaths from cancers related to the human papillomavirus (HPV), according to Dr Cristina Richie, a lecturer in ethics at the University of Edinburgh.

Continues at https://uk.news.yahoo.com/completely-unethical-women-excluded-life-050000270.html

I cant quite work out from the article whether in fact this is the situation throughout the UK.

The Green Book chapter on HPV is very informative, giving a lot of detail, although a bit tricky to read on a mobile as the original product was a book, A5 sized pages, and although it is only available electronically nowadays they have retained that format.
Please look at it, it's worth persevering!

Page 5 onwards of the chapter talks about the evolution of the vaccination schedule which is the most relevant bit for this thread,

The writer seems astounded the NHS would make a decision based on cost. But every single decision about whether to offer a treatment or drug on the NHS is based on cost effectiveness. That’s a huge part of what NICE does.

Surely these young women are of the cohorts that were vaccinated in their early teens?

As an aside: I don’t know whether to be horrified at my naivety, or recognise that I am thinking rationally compared to the young women LARPing.

The vaccine was first given in this country to prevent cervical cancer, so was given to females.

In Scotland?

I think you're right in that they should be already vaccinated as teens. I was trying to illustrate why transmen might be included in groups regarded as high risk for STDs. They mimic gay men because it's validating. No room for rationality!

Women can be poked, proded, butchered (let's not forget the false positive issue and unnecessary treatment), traumatised, stressed through having to undergo invasive examinations and treatments and lose large amounts of their income.

Because it's it's more convenient and potentially cheaper on the face of it (not necessarily when you add in associated indirect costs).

It's institutionalised misogyny.

Men wouldn't stand for it.

I don't know about that.

It is certainly true that as a population, gay men have a lot more sex partners.

People have been taught to think that it's immoral to think about this. They have no idea how decision making about public health is supposed to work, and I think COVID further muddied the waters.

This is not the sexist decision it is being painted as, the person leading the charge is conflating evidence on HPV risks when nobody was vaccinated with the very tiny group of women who chose not to be vaccinated when offered (or lived elsewhere as she did), weren't sexually active and exposed to HPV until after 25 (or up to 45) and could potentially benefit slightly (although being in a group that manage to avoid exposure for so long might also indicate lower risk overall).

Some men are a higher risk group post-25 because they were not vaccinated as teens, the way the girls of that cohort were. It's playing catch up for gay men because of evidence of cancers associated with HPV that affect them, evidence we didn't have when teenage girls were first vaccinated.

I haven't seen the evidence on trans men to know why they are included - perhaps they missed out in higher numbers at school because they didn't want to go and get it with all the girls. Maybe it's just a way to get them at all as the mangling of sex of medical records will have people falling through the cracks.

"I suspect part of it is also thinking in terms of gender stereotypes its not that some men's sexual behaviour creates more dangers, but probably the thinking is also that men are more likely to having sex with more than one partner, whilst women are presumed to be sitting at home being demure."

This hyperbole is not helping women or feminism - we have enough real battles to be getting on with. The people working in Public Health are both overwhelmingly female and extremely competent in analysing data. They are not so stupid to think that heterosexual men have more partners because sexist Bob down the pub thinks so. Every time a heterosexual man has sex, he does so with a women, so the sexual activity for both groups will be very similar. It is recognised that men report larger numbers of sexual partners, but that can be taken with a pinch of salt at the data level.

Also, if women were thought to be sitting home demure - then they wouldn't be assumed to have been exposed to HPV already and therefore unlikely to benefit. It obviously recognised that women aged 25-45 are sexually active, it's even counting against them - the opposite than you are claiming.

It is possible that the majority of men reporting many sexual partners are all having sex with the same prostituted women. Because of the exploitative nature of prostitution it is perfectly feasible for 100 men to all have sex with the same woman. No salt required.

The differernce between the number of partners reported by straight men and straight women is quite small compared to the differernce between gay and straight men. Which seems more the issue if we are talking about gay men being more vulnerable.

What isn't clear to me is why you would give the vaccine to someone already sexually active and likely to have been exposed to the virus?

What isn't clear to me is why based on recent statement men are being told yes go on having risky sex because we will help you, but telling women even though you are not as likely to engage in risky sex we aren't going to help you avoid getting cancer, even though we now our screening programmes aren't sufficient, let alone cancer treatment when and if it is diagnosed.

Sorry for those who dont have a sense of humour, but maybe this long explanation will help you grasp why I used the word demure.

Strange when so much effort is put into other areas of life by health professionals saying dont do this it will be bad for you, but when it means having to tell gay men sorry we dont think the NHS should finance your sex life, or tell heterosexual men you are a risk to women who are having to prostitute themselves to earn a living, and to yourself, we just say oh that's okay we will pay up so you can go on being a selfish, self entitlement male prick.

If there is money to be spend I would prefer it went to women, particularly if it meant stopping cancer from even starting.

It is loathsome that anyone would think, as it appeas even some on this thread do, that men cant and shouldn't be asked to control themselves, therefore we must ensure they are alright.

But ordinary women, no ... we dont even think about them.

That’s not at all what’s being told to women by NHS Scotland. The fact is the majority of women in that cohort will have either been vaccinated or sexually active (so exposed to HPV) already, so there is little benefit to vaccinating them now, objectively.

What are you talking about?

If the population of women were vaccinated as girls, they don't need to be vaccinated again.

OP, given that you are completely ignoring all the posts explaining the evolution of availability for this vaccine, would I be correct in suggesting that you have less of a problem with women not getting it, your problem is more that gay men can get it?

Out of interest, how many sexual partners does someone have to have before it becomes selfish and self-entitled, and is there a further number that needs to be reached before the appropriate social punishment is 'death from cancer with no NHS support'?

What isn’t clear to me is whether you can’t read or you refuse to.