Pro-family groups welcome Merck pullback from HPV campaign
by Jim Brown and Jody Brown
February 26, 2007
(OneNewsNow.com) - - The Family Research Council is welcoming drug manufacturer Merck's decision to stop lobbying states to mandate the vaccination of pre-teen girls with its human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine, Gardasil. The announcement by Merck comes in the wake of widespread criticism from conservative groups and parents who oppose the mandatory vaccinations. Meanwhile, Concerned Women for America has some concerns about what it perceives as a mandate 'machine' on Capitol Hill.Merck says its lobbying efforts to make Gardasil required for school attendance distracted from its goal of preventing cervical cancer. Pete Sprigg is vice president for policy at the Family Research Council (FRC), which has expressed concern over the message accompanying the vaccine.
"We feel that parents have the right and the duty to be the principle decision-makers regarding their children's health and that they are competent to do that," Sprigg says. "And there is not sufficient public health justification for overriding parental decision-making," he asserts, "because this is not the kind of disease that's transmitted through casual contact, the way other diseases that are covered by vaccine mandates might be."
When FRC met with Merck officials last year, before the Gardasil vaccine was approved, the drug maker disavowed any interest in having state mandates, the pro-family official notes. However, he says Merck soon went back on that promise, and the pharmaceutical company's lobbying has since been exposed as heavy-handed. According to an FRC "Washington Update" earlier this week, it was revealed that Merck was "donating money to targeted lawmakers in hopes that they would help pass vaccine mandates for Gardasil in their states." Associated Press reported in January that the drug manufacturer was channeling money for its state-mandate campaign through Women in Government, an advocacy group made up of female state legislators across the country.
The FRC has urged the medical community to view the administration of the Gardasil vaccine as a public health opportunity, Sprigg notes. He says healthcare providers are being encouraged to use the vaccinations as a chance "to have a more thoroughgoing discussion with young people about their sexual health, including ... the scientific fact that the best way to protect themselves against the full range of sexually transmitted diseases is through abstinence until marriage and fidelity within marriage."
Last month, Texas Governor Rick Perry issued an executive order requiring all 11- and 12-year-old girls in the state's public schools to receive Merck's Gardasil vaccine.
The 'mandate machine'
Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America (CWA), is expressing concern about the long-term effect of Merck's efforts to push for state-mandated vaccinations. "Merck's decision does not end this controversy," she says in a press release, "since politicians have grabbed the baton of pushing for state mandates." The drug maker, she says, has "built the machine, and now it is running on its own."
Wright notes that over the past 20 years, the number of mandated vaccines for children has doubled -- and at the same time, there has been an increase among children of cases of diabetes, asthma, autism, and learning disabilities. "It is unclear if there is a connection," acknowledges the CWA president, "but there is enough concern that another vaccine should not be mandated without further research."
The pro-family leader also points out that under the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, vaccine makers are exempted from liability that may arise from medical complications involving mandated vaccines.
