Recognizing the tremendous public health benfit of improving national vaccination rates for the human papillomavirus (HPV), the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center has again united with each of the 69 National Cancer Institute (NCI)-designated cancer centers in issuing a joint statement in support of recently revised recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
"Vaccination is a tremendous tool in cancer prevention efforts, it could virtually eliminate HPV-caused cancers," said Alan Ashworth, PhD, FRS, president of UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 49.5 percent of girls and only 37.5 percent of boys, ages 13-17 years, in the U.S. completed the vaccine series in 2016. These rates are significantly lower than those for other recommended adolescent vaccinations and fall well below the nation’s goal of 80 percent coverage by the end of this decade (U.S. Department of Health and Human Service’s Healthy People 2020 objective).
Increased HPV vaccination rates combined with appropriate cervical cancer screening measures could soon eliminate cervical cancer, with other HPV-related cancers in males and females to follow. In response, the NCI has issued a Call to Action in alignment with nation’s Heathy People 2020 goals to vaccinate more than 80 percent of males and females ages 13-15 by 2020, screen 93 percent of age-eligible females for cervical cancer by 2020; and improve follow up and proper treatment of females who screen positive for high grade cervical pre-cancerous lesions.
The NCI notes high HPV vaccination rates combined with cervical cancer screening and treatment will result in the elimination of cervical cancer in the near future and elimination of other HPV-related cancers thereafter.
HPV experts from the nation’s top cancer centers will meet June 7-8 at Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah, in Salt Lake City, to discuss strategies for reducing barriers to vaccination and, ultimately, eliminating cancers caused by HPV.
This is the third year that all 70 NCI-designated cancer centers have come together to issue a national call to action. Their unified goal is to send a powerful message to parents, adolescents and health care providers about the importance of HPV vaccination for the elimination of HPV-related cancers.
