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Naaman Zhou at The Guardian writes that Australia's free human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination programme in schools has been highly successful. The International Papillomavirus Society calculates that within 40 years, the number of new cases of cervical cancer will become nearly negligible.
HPV (human papillomavirus) is a sexually transmitted infection that causes 99.9% of cervical cancers. In 2007, the federal government began providing the vaccine for free to girls aged 12-13 years, and in 2013, it extended the program to boys.
Girls and boys outside those ages but under 19 can also access two doses of the vaccine for free. In 2016, 78.6% of 15-year old girls and 72.9% of 15-year old boys had been vaccinated.
As a result, the HPV rate among women aged 18 to 24 dropped from 22.7% to 1.1% between 2005 and 2015.
Eradication is still a few decades out but within reach. The vaccinations are backed up by more advanced cervical screening tests, which are themselves highly successful in detecting high-risk HPV infections before they turn really bad.
Source : Australia could become first country to eradicate cervical cancer. The Guardian
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by VLM on Tuesday March 06 2018, @09:41PM (6 children)
I saw a documentary on that topic from PBS so its kinda leftist biased, but the summary is in the earliest days the .gov blew as much time and effort as they could and were told to fuck off by the gays who felt it was just persecution. The gays only came around and flipped to the other extreme after the death rate went insane high. When even the leftist documentaries look like that, the narrative that Reagan left them to die is pretty laughable.
Its not even a good meme. The right hears that, knows the leftists are trying to guilt trip them, and replies with a nice short "good" or "wrong people is in the eye of the beholder" or whatever.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @10:07PM (3 children)
That's not true. In the early days, they were focused only on the gay community, and basically used it to spur homophobia. The gay community is the only reason that the virus ever received any serious attention as the view by most folks was that it was just gays and drug users that were effected. It wasn't until years into the epidemic that anything meaningful was done about it.
After years of protests and bringing it up again and again and again, eventually the government started taking it seriously.
And no, the community was not responsible for holding research back for all those years.
(Score: 4, Informative) by HiThere on Tuesday March 06 2018, @11:37PM (1 child)
That's both right and wrong. Many in the gay community were "committed" to indiscriminate sex (among willing partners). They were quite reluctant to accept advice on how to restrict the spread of AIDS. This isn't to say that they held back research, but they weren't willing to change dangerous patterns of behavior for quite awhile. So they (and needle sharing drug users) acted to significantly spread and intensify the AIDS epidemic for long after it became known.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 07 2018, @04:06PM
+1 informative, because I remember some of those attitudes and conversations. And, in retrospect, it seems that the gay attitude probably influenced hetero attitudes toward AIDS and homosexuality. In common street terms, "If the queers insist on trying to infect everyone they meet, then maybe AIDS really is God's punishment."
I highly doubt that anyone could do serious research on it, but that is food for thought.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 07 2018, @04:52PM
yeah, they were focused on the gay community, all right. they seeded the hiv with the hepatitis vaccines. why do you think it was intravenous drug users and homosexuals who contracted the virus originally? they were eating monkeys or some shit?
(Score: 5, Informative) by ilPapa on Tuesday March 06 2018, @10:07PM (1 child)
That is horseshit.
https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9828348/ronald-reagan-hiv-aids [vox.com]
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/mar/11/nancy-ronald-reagan-aids-crisis-first-lady-legacy [theguardian.com]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2015/12/01/a-disturbing-new-glimpse-at-the-reagan-administrations-indifference-to-aids/?utm_term=.5da97d04537b [washingtonpost.com]
And thirty-plus years later, the GOP is still complete shit when it comes to AIDS:
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/under-pences-leadership-response-to-heroin-epidemic-criticized-as-ineffective-226759 [politico.com]
You are still welcome on my lawn.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 06 2018, @10:29PM
Don't mind VLM, he is the resident neo-nazi-lite. He spews mind numbingly bad information and believes there is a conspiracy to keep whitey down.
TL:DR just mod down and move on