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Thursday, May 10, 2007

HPV Vaccine: Should it be mandatory?

I'm a single man, have no kids, and by extension, I have no daughters. However, if I had a daughter, I would not even think once, let alone twice, before getting her vaccinated against several strains of the human papillomavirus. I think this has the potential to become one of the most beneficial vaccines of the last 50 years, not so much based on the number of lives it will save, but rather, on the quality of those lives that will be so dramatically improved and the decreased medical costs for each victim of cervical cancer.

All that said, I am strongly against mandatory vaccination, as I feel this is a case where the state needs to cede authority to the parents. In fact, should any state make this vaccine mandatory, this would be one of the clearest examples of the state overstepping their authority. This is a decision that is best left to every woman and every parent, not to the government. As a libertarian, the very concept of this vaccine becoming mandatory is deeply offensive and disturbing. However, should each state decide that it wants to spend their taxpayers' money in that manner, and should the people approve of it, then it would be acceptable for the local public health organizations to administer this vaccine at reduced or no cost to the economically disadvantaged. Just a thought.

2 comments:

1138 said...

Lets give it a trial run with the global elite.

Mandelbrot's Chaos said...

Fair enough.