I wrote about the effectiveness of the HPV vaccines for girls.
Spoiler alert.
It is very freaking effective in decreasing certain HPV related cancers.
But I neglected to write about boys.
Because boys can be HPV carriers. And boys can develop HPV cancers.
Spoiler alert the HPV vaccine decreased cancer in boys as well. Not as dramatically as in girls but it decreased cancers related to HPV by FIFTY FREAKING PERCENT!
That is a huge number of boys and men not getting HPV related cancers.
These include cancers of the throat, the anus, and the head and neck.
The n of this data base was 615,000 males, ages 9-26, who received the vaccine and 2 million males who did not.
But, Kate, those do not look like equal numbers.
Oh, they’re not.
But statistics can make them be comparable.
Power of math!
Those who were vaccinated between 9 and 14 had a 42% lower risk and those who were vaccinated between 15-26 had a 50% lower risk.
Those are not small, insignificant numbers.
If you have any child/teenage/young adult between the ages of 9 and 26, pretty please with sugar on top get them vaccinated for the HPV virus.
The life you save might be your kid’s.
Dispatches from the Evening Shift 