CDC raises alarm that HPV vaccine Is ‘grossly underutilized’

Only a third of American teenage girls 13 to 17 were fully vaccinated against human papillomavirus virus (HPV) in 2012, a figure that declined somewhat in comparison with 2011, The New York Times reports. HPV is a main cause of cervical cancer and contributes to throat and other cancers as well. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has raised a clarion call that the vaccine against HPV is “safe, effective and grossly underutilized.” The U.S. ranks near to last among developed nations in adopting the three-dose vaccine, which the CDC first recommended in 2007 that girls should receive at age 11 or 12. A subsequent recommendation for boys to receive the vaccination at the same age followed in 2011. Through the 2012 National Immunization Survey-Teen (NIS-Teen), the CDC discovered that 84 percent of girls who hadn’t been vaccinated for HPV had still visited the doctor for another vaccine. If...