It’s not just on the presidential primary trail — and doctor’s offices — where Gardasil is a hot topic. There’s also the Sacramento halls of power.
Right now, Gov. Jerry Brown has legislation waiting for his signature that would allow twelve-year-old girls to get the vaccine without a parent’s permission (after efforts for a mandate failed in 2007).
The recently installed archbishop of Los Angeles, Jose Gomez, is urging the governor to veto the bill:
Parents have a fundamental right and duty to be responsible for their children’s physical and spiritual well-being. Children have a fundamental right to the guidance and protection of their parents.
This legislation would deny those rights.
AB 499 would allow children as young as 12 years old to decide by themselves — without their parents’ involvement — to get vaccines to prevent sexually transmitted diseases.
Our children need the knowledge and wisdom of their parents in order to make complicated medical decisions. This legislation would leave our children to make these decisions without the benefit of their parents’ wisdom.
That does not seem to be prudent public policy. Without allowing parents to be involved, there is no way we can ensure that our children will not be pressured by parties that may not have their best interests in mind, and may in fact have financial or other motivations to encourage our children to seek these vaccines.
Also, the legislature has not shown any need for a new state-funded program to vaccinate California’s pre-teens against sexually transmitted diseases. At a time when our state has serious fiscal problems, such a use of taxpayer dollars seems ill advised.
Since California minor girls can already bypass their parents to get abortions in the state, parental rights are already on disgracefully precarious ground there. I realize there are folks on different sides of the mandate question here, but, I suppose, at least with a mandate there is the opt-out option. As the California legislation stands, it would simply push parents out of the decision.
Should 12-year-old children be allowed to get vaccinated for flu without their parents' permission? For measles, DTP, rubella?
What about for lung cancer, or skin cancer, if there were vaccines for those?
Just admit your agenda, Kathryn, and stop disguising it in the white hood of "parental rights."
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI can't say that I approve a law that allows 12 year old girls to get abortion without parental consent,,,,,except in very unusual circumstances.....but if that's already the law in Ca, then this bill is consistent with whatever it is that they're thinking there.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseActually what it appears as is that they are emancipating minor females in matters pertaining to sex.
Similar to what the Left did in Spain. There apparently they went at it in the opposite fashion - lowered the age of consent to 13 to provide justification for legalizing abortion for minors without parental involvement.
It puzzles me that in portions of the US that there is a movement to put a 12 year old female in legal control of nearly everything but the age of her sex partner. The mental gymnastics required baffle me.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt's a vaccine against cancer, which must be administered BEFORE the age of secual activity to be effective. I suppose we can't expect people who lie about the effectiveness of contraceptives to accurately depict what Gardasil does.
Apparently, to the NRO wing of the Right:
Mandated health insurance in a state-not a deal breaker
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePrevious support of legal abortion-not a deal breaker
Vaccinating little girls before they get olded enough to catch a virus that can give them cancer-TOO FAR
Garadsil is a vaccine. Vaccines prevent VIRUSES. This particular one prevents the HPV which is a virus that can also cause cancer.
However, one gets the virus primarily through sexual contact.
No sexual contact, or at least sexual contact with a condom, less of a problem.
HPV is pretty much 100% preventable. As is AIDS.
Young girls do not need this unless they have some kind of genetic proclivity toward getting the virus in some way other than sexual contact.
Nice try.
And it's the Right that is anti-science. The Left doesn't even understand what science is.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWell thank goodness very, very few teens are having sex without their parents knowing about it!
And you're right, the link between Gardasil and avoiding cervical cancer is very very attenuated, what with Gardasil not immunizing from that cancer, but rather only against the virus that can very easily and often cause it....
Yes, HPV is nearly 100% avoidable, as is AIDS. If only there wasn't a biological imperative at work that compels human beings to have sex.
If there was an AIDS vaccine that likewise needed to be administered that young, would you also oppose it?
I sometimes wonder if you folks oppose this vaccine because it diminishes the chances that people will die from doing something you'd rather they not do, thus your words and wishes lose some potency.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"However, one gets the virus primarily through sexual contact."
"HPV is pretty much 100% preventable."
Primarily... pretty much...
According to the NIH, less than 2% of HPV cases are confirmed transmitted outside of sexual activity.
However, that means that HPV can somehow be transmitted outside of sexual activity-- we just don't know how yet.
That aside, the reason for inoculating a young population is a standard practice of public health. If the aim was to prevent HPV in *any one person*, then you're absolutely right, there's no need to vaccinate a virginal child.
If the aim, however, is for *society* to *eradicate* the virus, then you choose the lowest common denominator: an age group well-established to cover as many people prior to sexual activity as possible. While you and I would *hope* that most 12 year old girls are not having any sexual contact, on a statistical basis in the year 2011, that's probably a generous assumption. Certainly, it gets even more so at ages 13, 14, etc.
Personally, I'd be all for vaccinating at an EARLIER age, where we can be even more certain were eradicating the virus, one that eventually infects HALF of all Americans, most without any knowledge at all of having it, most without any "moral failures" in acquiring it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis issue of gardasil has never come up with my pediatrician. I have a 14 year old daughter, live in NY, and not a mention. He never gave the chicken pox vaccine until it was required. These vaccines are not without risk and no one knows for sure if they even work long term.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Young girls do not need this unless they have some kind of genetic proclivity toward getting the virus in some way other than sexual contact."
You can also get HPV if you happen to get raped (as I noted before), that would make it something that is somewhat less than 100% preventable, unless you can prevent rape 100% of the time as well. Girls should get the vaccine even if they are not planning to have any "sexual contact", because not all "sexual contact" is planned.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTwo significant errors in your comment aside from the misstatement noted in the first reply to your comment.
First the age of the person is irrelevant - the vaccine must be administered prior to exposure to one of the strains of HPV it is effective against. That could be 70 for some person.
The other is the presumption that sexual activity in young girls is occurring after the age of 12. Due to the increasing sexualization of children I have seen reports of 10 and 11 year olds engaging in sexual activities.
Apparently I haven't camped out at NRO or elsewhere enough to understand the context of your last three sentences.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe bill states :
"Some adolescents, from difficult family situations, will
either delay or simply fail to obtain services if
confronted with a legal requirement of parental consent."
External Link
This is obviously true. Not all teens have supportive or even communicative parents when it comes to sexual reality. Additionally many parents are in denial about their teenager's sexual activity (see Bristol Palin) and under the misconception their children "don't need this" because they aren't sexually active.
Obviously, in some perfect world, all parents would be open and honest with their children and enable them to make smart decisions. Unfortunately this just isn't the case and to think otherwise is being blind to reality. This bill isn't about excluding parents, it's about allowing teens who have no parental guidance or support to protect themselves in the future.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThis is merely the school health provider enabling act. One very much doubts that 12-17 year olds who regularly fail to use condoms or birth control are going to wake up one morning prior to becoming sexually active and decide to get vaccinated, Particularly when it takes three shots over a period of time.
HPV vaccination will be pushed in the 'Human Sexuality' (or whatever name the sex ed class goes by these days). This is a means for the liberal health establishment to bypass parents.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNo, it is about the left's obsession with the crotch, particularly the child's crotch. Anytime an issue can be connected in some way to human genitalia, the lefties go into a frenzy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseVery true, it's part of a coordinated effort to legitimize sexual activity among children. Many in the guilty-conscience left can't seem to deal with the fact that others disapprove of their behavior. They demand not only tolerance, but acceptance without judgment.
Their aim is to shape children's mores and attitudes as early as possible. If that means giving a twelve year old the power to make decisions regarding medical procedures, so be it. They'd probably make the age even younger if they thought they could get away with it.
We put our school district on notice that our permission in writing was for any type of health education or screening beyond traditional academic subjects. We also informed them that any attempts by district personnel to encourage our children to bypass us would be met with legal action. The existence of these foolish laws does not give the district license to promote them to our children.
Here is an excellent form letter we modified to put the district on notice:
External Link
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI wish I could say this in a more vulgar fashion to get it through the thick skulls of some around here, but if your 12 year old daughter goes out and gets a VACCINE without your permission, she's probably going to be doing all sorts of other, more fun things when she's 16.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI wonder if the media will blame Rick Perry for this . . . or George W. Bush.
NRO has a history on this topic.
But the Leftist media seems to want to bash Rick Perry and his crony capitalists that manufacture Gardasil while being all corporationy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseInformed consent does not happen until a child reaches the age of emancipation. Also, all side effects of the vaccine may not be known. What organization can be held legally liable for disablities that come later?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseReally… We want to be known as the party that is against vaccines that can save people’s lives. As the father of three very young, very beautiful girls, I will be waiting in line for them to get this vaccine. We were all teenagers once and no matter how much our parents tried raise us with good values, we ALL still made some pretty bad decisions that if not for the grace of God or just plain good luck did not ruin our lives. So please stop embarrassing the rest of us by insinuating that we assume our daughters will be promiscuous just because they have been vaccinated against a sexually transmitted cancer.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseYet another reason not to live in California.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere is no spiritual component to vaccination, so that part of his statement is a non sequitur.
I'm big on parental rights. I have a daughter. What I don't get is this resistance to vaccination. Why would you not protect your daughter? You really want an STD and cancer to be possible consequences of a youthful mistake or a rape?
I'm sorry, but that's just sick. Parents who don't get their kids vaccinated are irresponsible child abusers.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse