New research shows that uptake of the national human papillomavirus (HPV) immunisation programme differs across the UK, revealing local health inequalities with regard to cervical cancer risk.
The research highlighted that some areas are achieving a high vaccination rate and other areas achieving less comprehensive coverage. Published in the journal, PLOS ONE, the research explores the reasons why some girls and young women haven’t received the routine HPV vaccination, challenging previously held conceptions about the importance of ethnicity and religion in uptake rates. “There’s no question that the UK national HPV immunisation programme is one of the most successful in the world, but this research has highlighted thousands of young women who have either not been offered the vaccine, or where more could have been done to increase uptake. What’s more, there is a group of young women in certain social classes or who do not regularly attend school that could be vulnerable in terms of HPV risk. More efforts could be made to vaccinate these vulnerable young women who have not yet received the vaccine,” said Dr Tammy Boyce, author of the paper and honorary lecturer, Centre for Infection Prevention and Management, Department of Medicine, Imperial College London. School nurses have stated that young women’s social class and educational status were the most important factors in whether vaccination would be missed, rather than religious beliefs or ethnicity, which previous research had found.
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