Loving Our Children

The Right’s refusal to acknowledge that abstinence-based education is a failure is tantamount to neglect Among its many less-noticed accomplishments, this Administration has strangled funding for comprehensive sex education. Instead, it has thrown the immense weight of the US government behind abstinence-based education, an impractical ideological approach rooted in religious zealotry and a romantic notion […]

Should HPV Vaccines Be Mandatory?

In a recent Health Politics piece, I reviewed the facts on the new vaccine for the HPV virus. Following that airing, the governor of Texas moved to make the three-shot vaccination mandatory for adolescent girls in the state. A large public debate ensued, which drew in legislators, school officials, public health professionals and parents — […]

HPV Vaccine and the Recent JAMA Study: Knowing the Numbers

The recent study on Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) prevalence in U.S. women (published in the Feb. 28 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association) added fuel to the fire in the debate over whether states should mandate the vaccine for middle-school-aged girls. The numbers were dramatic — the overall HPV prevalence among U.S. […]