Most people are at risk of contracting the human pappilomavirus, which is known to cause cervical cancer in some women, but don?t expect your insurance company to pay for a vaccine.
It is the most prevalent sexually transmitted disease said Baltimore gynecologist Dee Dee Shiller. As much as 80 percent of the population carries HPV, though men and most women show little in the way of symptoms or side effects. There are many reasons to get vaccinated and few to avoid the series of three shots ? except maybe the cost ? at around $150 each for three shots, it is not covered by most insurance.
“They actually say that latex condoms do not protect you from HPV. The [virus goes] right through the pores of the condoms,” Shiller said. “We?re actually probably all at risk. I think that eventually everyone will be vaccinated.”
She pointed to a precedent in the rubella vaccination, administered to all children born in the United States. The respiratory illness causes a mild fever and rash for most people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But when pregnant women contract the measles variant, their fetus has a 20 percent chance of being born deaf, or with cataracts, heart defects, mental retardation, or liver and spleen damage.
Likewise, one percent of the population will contract cervical cancer from the papillomavirus, but the risk is significant enough to recommend all women get vaccinated, according to the CDC. The CDC recommended the HPV vaccine for women aged 9 through 26.
The vaccination has not been approved for men or for older women, and maker Merck & Company, Inc., does not recommend it for so called “off-label” uses, but some gynecologists like Shiller are already thinking outside the box.
“A lot of people are going to have to consider their own risks,” said gynecologist Dr. Fouad Abbas, of Baltimore. Married women who have gone through a divorce and are getting into a new relationship could develop HPV later in life, Abbas said.
He said he vaccinated himself and his teenaged son so they would not carry the disease, though no tests have shown the vaccination to be effective at protecting men.
“Exposure is the biggest thing. Working as a gynecologist you are on the front lines, and you could be potentially exposed,” he said.
