The Cuban pharmaceutical expert Dagmar García listed today the benefits of the upcoming vaccination campaign against the Human Papillomavirus (HPV), which will benefit all nine-year-old girls on this Caribbean island In her opinion, one of the primary reasons for the health authorities to take this decision is to confront the problem: the existing relationship between HPV infection and Cervical Cancer, she reflected on her social media
It is common for almost all sexually active people to be infected with some type of HPV in their life. If an infection with these viruses persists for many years, it can generate slow changes in the cells of a woman’s cervix, which over time can become cancer, she explained
Cervical cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer death in women in many parts of the world, she alerted
The other, is the solution: the Vaccine against HPV, a sort of ‘training’ for your immune system. It teaches your body to recognise and fight the most dangerous types of the virus before you are exposed to them, indicated the deputy director of the Finlay Institute of Vaccines, creator of one of the injectables administered in Cuba against Covid-19, the Soberana vaccine
In the case of the vaccine against HPV that will be applied in Cuba, it is the bivalent CECOLIN, which protects against serotypes 16 and 18, the most frequent, highlighted the scientist
In her comments, she also explained why this is important. Because it is estimated that these two types (16 and 18) are responsible for approximately 7 out of 10 cases of cervical cancer in the world
By protecting you against them, CECOLIN is protecting you against the main cause of this disease, she underscored. The vaccine is most effective when applied before exposure to the virus. This is why it is primarily recommended for girls and adolescents before the start of sexual life
CECOLIN is a safe and effective vaccine, and has the endorsement of prequalification by the WHO. It is produced by the Chinese company Innovax. Once again, the solution is to vaccinate. It is a decision that is 15-20 years ahead of the problem, cervical cancer, warned the pharmaceutical expert
The HPV vaccine will then form part of the childhood vaccination schedule, which administers up to now an annual average of some four million 800 thousand doses of 13 different types of vaccines, simple or combined, aimed at the prevention of 13 diseases, according to official figures from the Ministry of Public Health
Of the immunobiologicals, eight are of national production, the rest imported and now the HPV vaccine is added
Statistics specify that after six decades of being in operation, the national immunisation programme has achieved the elimination of six diseases (polio, diphtheria, measles, whooping cough, rubella, and mumps); two severe clinical forms in children under one year (neonatal tetanus and tuberculous meningitis); and two serious clinical complications (congenital rubella syndrome and post-mumps meningitis)
