SWITZERLAND – According to new research published by the World Health Organization (WHO), a single dose of the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine could be the key to permanently eliminating cervical cancer.

Human papillomavirus, or HPV, is a sexually transmitted infection (STI) that is responsible for more than 95 percent of cervical cancer cases.

According to a WHO news release, recent evidence reviewed by the WHO Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization (SAGE) revealed that a single dose of the HPV vaccine provided “comparable efficacy to the two- or three-dose regimens.”

There were an estimated 604,000 new cases of cervical cancer in 2020, resulting in 342,000 deaths According to the WHO.

It has risen to become the fourth most common cancer in women worldwide, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, where 90 percent of new cases were recorded in 2020.

This new discovery could pave the way for a less expensive and more efficient method of providing HPV and cervical cancer prevention to women and girls in low-income regions such as Oceania and Africa, which account for 30.9 percent and 21.1 percent of global cases, respectively.

I firmly believe the elimination of cervical cancer is possible,” WHO Assistant Director-General Dr. Princess Nothemba Simelela said of the findings.

In 2020, the Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative was launched to address several challenges, including the inequity in vaccine access.

“This single-dose recommendation has the potential to take us faster to our goal of having 90% of girls vaccinated by the age of 15 by 2030.”

The HPV vaccine was first introduced in 2006, and by 2018, the WHO reported that 100 countries had already included it in their national immunization schedules.

Unfortunately, those 100 countries only covered about 30 percent of the global target population, and immunization uptake has been slow, particularly in low- to middle-income countries.

By 2020, the total number of countries had only risen to 111.

The previously established regimen for administering the vaccine included a two-dose schedule, which made tracing and following up with recipients difficult.

A one-dose program would not only alleviate this problem, but it would also save money and allow resources and efforts to be redistributed to other health initiatives.

SAGE has recommended an updated schedule for HPV vaccinations worldwide based on these new findings.

The new recommendations would call for a one- or two-dose schedule for girls aged 9 to 14, as well as young women aged 15 to 20, with women over the age of 21 receiving two doses within a six-month interval.

SAGE urges all countries to introduce HPV vaccines and prioritize multi-age cohort catch up of missed and older cohorts of girls,” SAGE Chair Dr. Alejandro Cravioto said in a statement.

These recommendations will enable more girls and women to be vaccinated and thus [prevent] them from having cervical cancer and all its consequences over the course of their lifetimes.”

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