The HPV vaccine mandate controversy continues to grow, as the Illinois Review makes the New York Times Saturday . . .
We at IR now suppose "asking questions" here and here is to be considered "speculation."
And in Illinois, a bill introduced by a legislator who had the virus the vaccine is intended to prevent prompted a conservative group’s blog to speculate that she had been promiscuous.
“I’m offended by their ignorance, but if I have to take a hit to educate people, I’m willing to do it,” said the bill’s sponsor, Debbie Halvorson, the Democratic majority leader in the Illinois Senate.
Ms. Halvorson is also a director of Women in Government, a national association of state legislators that has embraced the fight against cervical cancer and has received funding from Merck. The group has posted model mandatory vaccination legislation on its Web site, www.womeningovernment.org. The rush for mandatory inoculation — most of the state proposals have been introduced since the beginning of the year — is unusual. It was only last June that federal regulators approved the vaccine, called Gardasil.
It goes on . . .
Opponents of mandatory inoculation include anti-vaccine activists, who argue that the vaccine has not been tested in enough young girls and who have listed various side effects reported among users, which have included dizziness, nausea and fever. Others include conservative Christian groups who oppose mandatory H.P.V. vaccination on moral grounds, and those who are generally distrustful of the pharmaceutical industry.
“It’s a very messy thing to be promoting right now,” said Fran Eaton, editor of the conservative blog in Illinois where one writer attacked Senator Halvorson’s morality. “If you’re a conservative, you’re going to be worried about parental rights. If you’re a liberal, you’re worried that the pharmaceutical companies are taking over the United States.”
