SKIRMISHER

I’m unsettled, to say the least, by what Christina Page discussed in her article on Nerve. One of the world’s first cancer vaccine is for women, and it’s called Gardasil, created by Merck. Last June 8, the USFDA approved it because it’s “100% effective at immunizing against the two HPV strains that cause 70% of all cervical cancers.”

And like what they say against birth control and condoms, the pro-life Religious Right opposed the vaccine. Huh?

You have to be a woman to understand the magnitude of the threat of cervical cancer. And the Religious Right’s opposition to everything that has to do with sex is just so very medieval. They maintain that these things “encourage” promiscuity. But let me tell you this, nobody can stop sex. Women and men wanna do it all the time. We’re not touted as the “sexiest primate” for nothing. And with that as given, the only logical thing for human beings to do is to make sex as safe as possible.

That’s why I’m quite relieved with this vaccine. And quite irked by the “ignorant, malicious” opposition against it. But I think the funnier thing than railing against it is eating your own words: because now, the Religious Right seems to “approve” of it, probably afraid to be labelled “pro-cancer” this time.

According to Dr. Gregory Zimet, chair of the vaccine committee at the Society for Adolescent Medicine, this is the Right’s attempt to repackage its original agenda. “The softening of their position came, at least in part, from the recognition that being labeled as pro-cancer didn’t really fit well with their attempt to present themselves as pro-life,” said Zimet. “Many of them are now saying, ‘We’ve never been opposed to it,’ even though I looked at their websites a year and a half ago and they were. What they’ve done is said, ‘Of course we’re not opposed to this vaccine that can save the lives of our daughters, our wives and our mothers — but we just don’t think it should be forced on people.’ So, I think partly [the new message] is cover and partly it may be a warning — as they say, a shot across the bow.”

Shameless.

THE VIRGIN VACCINE [Nerve]

[Image by Laura]

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