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A vaccine that prevents a cancer, with the numbers in

1.7 million women followed. The effect is not subtle.

A vaccine that prevents a cancer, with the numbers in

Almost all cervical cancer is caused by human papillomavirus, which makes it one of very few cancers with a vaccine. The question was never the mechanism but the size of the effect in a real population, and that took a generation to answer.

A Swedish study followed 1.7 million women and found that those vaccinated before the age of 17 had an 88 per cent lower rate of invasive cervical cancer than the unvaccinated. Those vaccinated between 17 and 30 had a 53 per cent lower rate. The difference between the two figures is the point: the vaccine works best before exposure.

Sources

Lei et al., New England Journal of Medicine (2020); Falcaro et al., The Lancet (2021)

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General information, not medical advice. Anything persistent or painful belongs with a doctor, who has heard it before.