How Important Are HPV vaccines?
A vaccine prevents the infection or spread of a specific disease by providing protection. A vaccine can be made up of a protein-based substance (a vial), a protein concentrate, a cell culture medium, and a preservative. In order for a person to receive a vaccine, they must have an adequate immune system that can battle infections. In cases of natural infection, a person would need to take in a bit more of what they eat.
Nucleic acid vaccines (NAV) provide protection through the use of genetic material called nucleic acid. Nucleic acid is used as a “base” for creating viruses, because it carries the genetic code that causes a specific disease. The DNA is hidden in a complementary DNA structure that prevents the viruses from causing a problem. When the body’s immune system recognizes a foreign substance, called an antigen, it mounts an immune defense. Antigens come from a variety of sources including bacteria, spores, cells, and tumors.
Many children and adults contract illnesses or infections from passing on live viral agents to others. While this occurs frequently in nature, it is also a risk to people who work with or assist animals in contact with infectious diseases. Animal antibodies caused by exposure to an animal source are usually strong enough to fight off a common disease, such as measles. However, these same animal antibodies may prove useless against a vaccine that was developed to protect humans from getting the disease in the first place. For these reasons, vaccines that protect humans from infectious disease require a repeated exposure to the virus or a subsequent immune response.
Studies show that babies that receive their first dose of vaccine early in life to gain the most protection from serious illness than those that are not vaccinated at all. This early protection is most valuable when the child is between two to five years old. Some studies have shown that vaccinated children catch more of the virus than in vaccinated children. The American Academy of Pediatrics now recommends that all pregnant women receive a dose of hepatitis B vaccine as well. This vaccine can protect both the mother and her unborn baby should the mother develop an infection while giving birth. Since hepatitis B vaccine has been approved for use in healthy children, women who have not received a dose of this vaccine before pregnancy should now receive one.
One of the newest vaccines being evaluated is the quadrivalent HPV vaccine, which covers four different types of HPV. Unlike the other vaccines being developed for the past several years, this new product represents a major advance in the field of vaccines. The goal of developing these four vaccines was to protect women from the various strains of HPV.
Many of the HPV vaccines being evaluated now require fewer doses and are being administered into the thigh, hips, and pelvis instead of the spine. These new HPV vaccines represent a huge leap in the field of protecting the American public. Between these new vaccines and the previously existing vaccines that protect against the strains of HPV that cause genital warts, there are now more vaccines available than ever before in history. Experts expect that the world will face an outbreak of HPV-related diseases, and that children will be born with defects related to the HPV virus. With all of these new developments and additional research being conducted on various HPV strains, it is too early to say whether HPV vaccine prevention will be effective or not, but it is safe to say that scientists have created a vaccine that every child in the United States should receive if they are born in the United States.