In July 2006 the FDA approved Merck’s Gardisil for sale and marketing to girls and women ages nine to 26. Gardisal was shown to be 100% effective in preventing infection by strains 16 and 18 of HPV, the human papillomavirus which causes about 70% of cervical cancer cases.
Merck, with support by the CDC, quickly began lobbying state legislatures to pass laws mandating that middle school age girls receive the vaccine. In 2007 Merck backed off their lobbying efforts.
In Australia, where 3.7 million doses of the vaccine have already been distributed, about 1,013 adverse reactions have been reported including soreness, swelling, redness or other reaction at the injection site, dizzines, neusea, vomiting, and a possibility of pancreatitis. Three women developed pancreatitis soon after inoculation.
Pancreatitis is a sudden attack of severe upper abdominal pain where pancreatic enzymes irritate and burn the pancreas, and leak out into the abdominal cavity, which can result in serious complications including respiratory, kidney or heart failure, all potentially fatal.
The claims linking Gardasil to pancreatitis, published in The Medical Journal of Australia, were made by Dr. Amitabha Das and his colleagues who say an extensive investigation could find no other cause for the pancreatitis and while a coincidental illness could not be ruled out, “neither can HPV vaccination be excluded as a potential cause”.
The Theraputic Goods Administration (TGA), the Australian regulatory body is investigating the claims.
The UK government Department of Health has mandated that all schoolgirls aged 12 through 13 be routinely vaccinated against the HPV virus, but have chosen Glaxo-Kline’s Cervarex over Merck’s Gardasil. They cite cost as the deciding factor.
