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pensmama87
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I don’t disapprove of the drug existing or being used. But I do think it’s irresponsible marketing.
Study: HPV vaccination does not increase risky sexual behavior by girls
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niceatheist
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The message is just as equally “now you don’t have to worry if your partner was careful or not.” In many cases women have no way to guarantee whether their sexual partner was or is being careful, so any vaccine or treatment that minimizes the chances of spreading an STD and the consequences of that infection is a good thing.
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niceatheist
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I think trying to simplify any public health campaign down to “Be good or you will be punished by a terrible disease” is essentially an immoral justification for trying to enforce a particular moral code. Someone brought up gay men being more likely to partake in risky behavior because newer drugs can reduce the HIV viral load in the blood stream down to almost non-existent. Well, guess what, gay men have been partaking in these kinds of risky behaviors for a very long time, and even when there was no effective way to bring viral load down so that infecting one’s sex partners became pretty unlikely, there was a lot of data showing a good many gay men were still partaking in high-risk sexual practices.pensmama87:
The opposite message would be “we are going to discourage this use of this drug because we want the fear and actual risk of infection to be utilized to prevent that behavior.” To that I also say, “Yikes!”Lou2U:
I will say, that I saw an ad for the new HIV drug that lowers risk of transmission, and that seemed to be its exact message: “now you don’t have to bother being careful!” Yikes.
Imagine, if you will, that someone developed a safe pill that could lower arterial clogging and the other effects of bad diet, heavy drinking or smoking. Would it be justified not to market the pill or even see its widespread usage because some people might respond to the pill’s existence by eating as many cheeseburgers or chugging as many beers as they could? From a public health perspective, peoples’ individual or group motivations should take a back seat to actually decreasing the number of premature deaths and the number of expensive medical interventions.
As Isaac Asimov famously said “Never let your sense of morality prevent you from doing the right thing.” Trying to block or minimize the vaccination of people against HPV because somehow it will cause a decay in public morals is really another way of saying “Thou shalt be punished for risky sex.”
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pensmama87
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exnihilo
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Harm reduction is an interesting and contentious subject. The ads you are talking about are the equivalent of tobacco companies advertising filtered cigarettes as a healthier alternative.
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niceatheist
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No, it’s not the same thing, because filters were always pure marketing hype, and do little or nothing to reduce the harmful effects of tar. Gardasil, on the other hand, has a measurable impact on HPV infections. And frankly, considering how terrible cervical cancer can be, if they have to market it with scantily clad models, I would have no objection. The issue here is public health, not promoting anyone’s particular moral views. I’ll leave the moral marketing to your favorite neighborhood church, synagogue, mosque or temple.
LeafByNiggle
Well-known member
(Note: this was in reference to “the new HIV drug”, not the HPV vaccine, but the point is similar).
It does not make sense to develop a drug and then suppress knowledge of it. Any benefit that might have been derived (including to society in general) would also be lessened. Perhaps it would have been better if the ad you saw was directed solely at doctors, and then the doctors could relay the benefits of that drug to their patients in whatever way seems best to them. So I partly agree with you on the direct-to-consumer marketing campaign, if that is indeed what you saw. But I think doctors definitely should be told these facts.
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pensmama87
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I have not asserted that knowledge should be suppressed. I think the advertising I’ve seen for that particular drug is in incredibly poor taste and irresponsible. I don’t think it has to be advertised that way, as you point out.
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LeafByNiggle
Well-known member
I don’t suggest that the message - “This drug lowers risk of transmission” should be altered. I just think it should be in a medical journal that doctors read rather than in the popular media. I seriously doubt that they said “now you don’t have to bother being careful.”LeafByNiggle:
I have not asserted that knowledge should be suppressed. I think the advertising I’ve seen for that particular drug is in incredibly poor taste and irresponsible. I don’t think it has to be advertised that way, as you point out.
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Viki63
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I am more concerned about the potential for adverse effects with the vaccine. I don’t want to get into an argument about it. but if you google “concerns about HPV vaccination” you will see some reputable physicians and organizations who also have concerns.
My kids have had other vaccines so I don’t think getting this vaccine increases negative behavior…any more then having a tetanus shot and saying kids now deliberately go stepping on rusty nails, and so on, lol.
I don’t think kids think this way, they just worry about the needle lol. Perhaps my kids are different, idk.
I don’t think kids think this way, they just worry about the needle lol. Perhaps my kids are different, idk.
LeafByNiggle
Well-known member
Bad, bad advice! Whenever you go searching “the Internet” looking for a specific opinion you are sure to find some slick-looking page that looks very authoritative. It will usually have a long list of theories with no links to primary sources, but it will have carefully-curated quote mining from carefully-selected official-sounding organizations that sound very authoritative.
Actually I did perform the search you requested, and the vast majority of hits I got were from the CDC and from organizations of doctors, and they all said the risks were mild and worth it. After going down the list I eventually found an anti-HPV web page with a long list of horrible side-effects that could not possibly be compatible with the mild warnings given by the majority of organizations. And that site was a promoter of “natural health remedies.” Well of course! Now had I looked further I might have found a site such as you recommend that would be harder to debunk. But remember what I said about discarding all opinions until you find the one you like. You can’t expect to find truth that way.
Right now, with vaccines in general, America is facing a crisis of public health with the growing rejection based on irrational fear. Old diseases that had been essentially eradicated in the US are starting to make a comeback because the percentage of school children whose parents have declined for reasons of “conscience” any childhood vaccines is dangerously high.
This is not unlike what is going on in Pakistan , Afghanistan and Nigeria, the last three countries in the world where there is any incidence of polio in the wild. And what is preventing the total eradication of that disease as we did with smallpox? It is irrational fears stoked by Islamic extremists that the polio vaccine is a Western plot to make all Muslims sterile.
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MikeInVA
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That sounds like the same ads they show at the clinics to show why you should get the vaccination.
LeafByNiggle
Well-known member
Of course. The anti-vaxxers want to look as much like their competition as possible.LeafByNiggle:
That sounds like the same ads they show at the clinics to show why you should get the vaccination.
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exnihilo
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You should have concerns. Vaccine makers are like the government, immune from liability. Common sense tells you when someone is immune from liability that is dangerous. They have no incentive to act with care.
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niceatheist
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Vaccination programs are probably the single most effective group of public health initiatives in history. The reason for protection from liability was simply to assure that the manufacturers from lawsuits due to the sad inevitability that a small group of people would suffer harmful side effects.
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exnihilo
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I’d argue sanitation and isolation are the most effective health initiative.
Regardless of the offered reason, who would trust a drug maker with zero immunity? They have no reason to care about dangers. And if drug makers need immunity that is proof that their product is in fact dangerous.
Regardless of the offered reason, who would trust a drug maker with zero immunity? They have no reason to care about dangers. And if drug makers need immunity that is proof that their product is in fact dangerous.
LeafByNiggle
Well-known member
But history and shows that they have acted with care, and your “common sense” analysis is anything but sensible. Unjustified warnings like this are more dangerous than the vaccines because of what it can do to erode our public health. Talk to your family doctor and that is what you will hear.Viki63:
You should have concerns. Vaccine makers are like the government, immune from liability. Common sense tells you when someone is immune from liability that is dangerous. They have no incentive to act with care.
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niceatheist
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Because vaccines work, that’s why.
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exnihilo
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I don’t know that history shows that. What is your evidence for that claim?
You may not think it common sense but I doubt you’d for instance eat at a restaurant that made you sign a waiver releasing them of any and all liability.
You may not think it common sense but I doubt you’d for instance eat at a restaurant that made you sign a waiver releasing them of any and all liability.
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