HPV Vaccine - A Vaccine against cancer?

I have some good medical information to share with you all. As you all know that I recently started a medical blog, which is nothing but a stand-still since I started. As a friend of mine has said, it is a wrong decision to do that because medical knowledge is for all and not for a particular set of people, who are interested in it.

And hence, here is my next medical post on the new HPV vaccine, which is the talk of the day in the USA.

1. Cancer is a deadly disease characterized by uninterrupted abnormal multiplication of body cells.
2. It can effect any part of the body
   
3. It is caused by some stimulus which makes the tissues(parts) in the body produce new cells constantly. Let us say you have an ill fitting dental cap which is constantly rubbing on your cheek for years you have a higher probably that some of those cells get changed to a stem cell, keeping on producing cells and causing a cancer.
4. The same principle applies for a virus causing chronic infection and irritating the cells around it and also for a sunburn irritating you skin constantly for years or for a constant gush of acid from your stomach irritating the esophagus for years.

OK! Now that we know something about cancer, let us see what can be done to AVOID such deadly disease. We have a great news. Let us go through a brief story on what screening methods are available to identify EARLY CANCER or STAGES BEFORE CANCER (Pre-cancerous stages).

These are the usual tests people here get done as a routine screening from 35 - 45 years of age.

Colonoscopy : For Colon Cancer

Pap smear : For Womb Cancer

Mammography : For breast cancer

BSE (Brest self Exam) : For breast cancer

Prostate Specific Antigen : For Prostate Cancer

As I already told you that virus is implicated in cancer causation, a better example for that would be the cervical cancer caused by HPV virus.

India has a heave burden of this disease.To an estimated annual global incidence of 500,000 cervical cancers, India contributes 100,000, ie. 1/5 of the world burden.1 The magnitude of the problem is thus more than evident.

Now coming to the recent developments in cancer medicine, a vaccine is designed against Human papilloma virus which is like any other vaccine prevents infection with the deadly virus.
The major constraint for this to be widely introduced in India is cost. But I think most of the upper middle class and upper class can still have access to this vaccine.
The possibility of increased health disparities between the rich and the poor is high, but there have been efforts in reducing the cost of the vaccine(Merck, ICMR ink deal on HPV vaccine).

Vaccinating men could be the best way to prevent the spread of the cancer-causing virus among women.