The Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center has partnered with 71 other National Cancer Institute (NCI)-designated cancer centers and partner organizations to issue a joint statement urging the nation’s physicians, parents and young adults to get the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination back on track.
Dramatic drops in annual well visits and immunizations during the COVID-19 pandemic have caused a significant vaccination gap and lag in vital preventive services among U.S. children and adolescents-especially for the HPV vaccine.
“The HPV vaccine prevents the infection of HPV, or the virus that causes HPV-related cancers, such as cervical cancer,” said Ken Cowan, MD, PhD, director of the Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center. “Parents who are taking their children and adolescents for the COVID-19 vaccine can inquire with their health care providers about the HPV vaccine. Both girls and boys can receive the HPV vaccine, and parents can know that when their children receive this, they are doing everything they can to prevent their children from potentially developing this type of cancer.”
Nearly 80 million Americans – one out of every four people – are infected with HPV, a virus that causes several types of cancers. Of those millions, more than 36,000 will be diagnosed with an HPV-related cancer this year. Despite those staggering figures and the availability of a vaccine to prevent HPV infections, HPV vaccination rates remain significantly lower than other recommended adolescent vaccines in the U.S.
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, HPV vaccination rates lagged far behind other vaccines and other countries’ HPV vaccination rates. According to 2019 data from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), slightly more than half (54%) of adolescents were up to date on the HPV vaccine. Those numbers have declined dangerously since the pandemic:
- Early in the pandemic, HPV vaccination rates among adolescents fell by 75%, resulting in a large cohort of unvaccinated children.
- Since March 2020, an estimated one million doses of HPV vaccine have been missed by adolescents with public insurance- a decline of 21% over pre-pandemic levels.
The U.S. has recommended routine HPV vaccination for females since 2006, and for males since 2011. Current recommendations are for routine vaccination at ages 11 or 12 or starting at age 9. Catch-up HPV vaccination is recommended through age 26.
NCI Cancer Centers strongly encourage parents to vaccinate their adolescents as soon as possible. The CDC recently authorized COVID-19 vaccination for 12-15-year-old children allowing for missed doses of routinely recommended vaccines, including HPV, to be administered at the same time.