Pune’s BJ Medical College and Sassoon General Hospital will launch an ambitious vaccination drive on Tuesday by immunising undergraduate MBBS (girl) students against Human Papilloma Virus (HPV)–the most common viral infection of the reproductive tract.
“Prevention is better than cure,” Dr Eknath Pawar, Dean of the hospital said, adding that was the first time that mass vaccination of students was being taken up in Maharashtra on such a large scale.
Looking at the problem of HPV infection in the country, a vaccination drive of all girl students upto 26 years of age has been initiated. “This vaccination for MBBS, nursing and postgraduate students will be only for those studying at our institute. The immunisation programme is not compulsory, but we are encouraging our students (initially girls) to take the vaccine at 0, 2 and 6 months,” Dr Pawar said.
“This is a very important measure to prevent cervical cancer,” Dr Murlidhar Tambe, head of department of community medicine, BJ Medical College said.
The vaccine has been procured at a subsidised cost and will be provided free of cost to students. Initially 1,000 students (girls) will be immunised. A total of 3,000 doses will be procured from Serum Institute of India.
Burden of cervical cancer
HPV is the most common viral infection of reproductive tract; causing a range of conditions in men and women, such as genital warts, anal cancer, vaginal cancer, penile cancer, oro-pharyngeal cancer, cervical cancer including precancerous lesions that may progress to cancer. HPV is a major cause of cervical cancer with 14 HPV types identified as oncogenic. Among these HPV types 16 and 18 are responsible for most HPV related cancers. Every year about 1.23 lakh new cases and 77,300 deaths due to cancer are reported in the country.
SII’s Cervavac vaccine
Cervavac, the first indigenous HPV vaccine for prevention of cervical cancer and other HPV associated cancers, has been developed and manufactured by Pune’s Serum Institute of India. The vaccine primarily targets females and males aged 9-26 years.
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