‘Herd protection’ strategy is dangerous gamble in age of Tinder

OF COURSE gay and bisexual men should be vaccinated against HPV. They suffer from HPVrelated cancers disproportionately and ought to have been included years ago.

But last week’s decision to include them throws into sharp relief how profoundly unfair the vaccination campaign is.

Gay and bisexual men aged 16 to 45 are the only adult group to get HPV vaccination on the NHS.

The jab is equally good at preventing HPV infection in either sex. But to be most effective vaccination should take place before infection – before sexually activity commences – and so girls aged 12 and 13 are now vaccinated.

Why aren’t we vaccinating boys? As usual it boils down to money: NHS health economists say it isn’t ‘cost effective’. They predict immunising girls will lead to such steep declines in HPV that males will be protected by default, a principle known as ‘herd protection’.

Gay and bisexual men are being offered the jab on the basis that vaccinating girls will give them ‘little indirect protection’, says Public Health England.

But straight males won’t be protected either, if they happen to have sexual contact with someone who has not been immunised – such as a British woman who hasn’t had the jab, or a woman from abroad.

Government experts argue their approach will protect the groups most likely to develop HPV-related cancers. But it ignores the fact many HPV cancers occur in other groups.

‘Herd protection’ is likely to be very incomplete.

How do you guarantee it will work on Tinder?