After zealous crusading for mass HPV vaccination by media, special-interest goups,  politicians and the medical establishment , the Irish Health Service last week commenced implementing an injection-by-Gardasil program for all 12 year old schoolgirls.

Irish parents signed consent forms as media  medical experts  glorified the  ‘terrific’ vaccine.

It seems Irish media etiquette forbids mentioning the flood of deaths and debilitating reactions reported in the US  for Gardasil recipients.  As of Jun 2010 (4 years after it’s approval),   71 deaths of girls & young women, along with over 18000 side effects had been reported to the FDA via the ‘VAERS*’ system (these incidents are probably greatly underreported*). 

The recent  track record of (Gardasil manufacturer) Merck does not render it unlikely that they would deny for years the dangers of an unsafe product, before finally being forced to pull it from the market (and then pay out billions in settlements).    A record, incidentally, that does not exclude deceptive marketing tactics to play down a drug’s health risks. 

In Jun 2010 Research Physician Scott Reuben, MD, who pled guilty to falsifying research on the use of  Vioxx (rofecoxib; Merck) was sentenced in a Boston federal court to 6 months in prison for healthcare fraud and ordered to repay pharmaceutical companies that financed his research.  Merck voluntarily withdrew Vioxx ( Rofecoxib) from the market in 2004 after evidence showed the painkiller boosted the risk for heart attack, stroke, and other cardiovascular events.   Dr. Reuben admitted that he had not enrolled any patients in trials but, instead, had simply made up findings.

Another  top research professor , funded by Merck to design and conduct the Gardasil Clinical Safety Trials, admitted it was not tested for effectiveness in younger girls under 16.  “Giving it to 11-year-olds is a great big public health experiment ” said Dr. Diane M. Harper, “At 11, these girls don’t get cervical cancer – they won’t know for 25 years if they will get cervical cancer.  She also spoke about the need for  ‘more complete warnings’  .

Public-Private Partnership
Despite fudged clinical trials lacking a true placebo, the CDC* and FDA^ fast-tracked it’s approval in the US.  They were approving a vaccine whose core technology had been co-invented and patented by researchers in the NIH (National Institute of Health), a sister agency of the CDC & FDA in the US Department of Health and Human Services.  This technology had been licenced to Merck who then developed the vaccine.

Dr. Julie Gerberding served as the Director of the CDC when it approved Gardasil.  She is now the president of Merck Vaccines .  Such revolving-door-culture occurrences between Regulation Agencies and Big Pharma companies raise questions on the credibility and independence of the vaccine approval process.