Parents saying 'no' to vaccines threatens UK's plan to wipe out cervical cancer

A slump in the number of children being vaccinated in schools is threatening a plan to “eradicate” cervical in England. Schools are seeing a reluctance by some parents to get their children protected against the human papillomavirus, or HPV, since the end of the pandemic.

There has been a 17 percent fall in the numbers getting the jab for HPV which causes 99 per cent of all , killing thousands of women every year. The main reason for the drop off has been blamed on ‘vaccine fatigue’ which has also hit children’s injections for measles, and diphtheria.

Other factors have been increased pupil absences from school since Covid - which has almost doubled. In 2023 to 2024, 1.49 million children were persistently absent from school, 20 per cent of all pupils. Before Covid it was 11 per cent.

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One reason given by School Age Immunisation Services (SAIS) providers for the gradual decline in HPV coverage is the number of non-returned and declined consent forms from parents.

There has also been a ‘vaccine hesitancy and fatigue’ following the pandemic. Staffing issues making it more ‘challenging’ to chase up parents for their forms have also been blamed.

Over the years the double whammy of vaccination and smear-test screening has meant death rates have fallen by 75 per cent since the 1970s. By 2019 the figure in England had dropped from 853 to 685 deaths a year. But there are concerns the battle against cervical cancer could be derailed with the 90 per cent of girls aged 12 to 13 having vaccinations before the pandemic, dropping to 73 per cent last year. For boys, it went from 82 per cent to just 68 per cent.

England is now launching a catch-up campaign for children, according to the Sunday Times, in a bid to eliminate the disease by 2040. To keep on track it has to get vaccination rates back up to 90 per cent by 2030. The campaign will to talk about why they have declined the jabs.

All youngsters aged 12 and 13 are eligible for HPV vaccinations and adults can also request one from their GP up to the age of 25.

Caroline Temmink, NHS England's director of vaccination, said she was still very confident that cervical cancer could be eliminated and the vaccine rates could be restored.

"But we need parents to work with us," The Sunday Times reported. "It's really exciting to have the opportunity to say to this whole generation that cervical cancer and some other cancers shouldn't be a risk for you."

London has the worst rate of this vaccine coverage, down as low as 61 per cent, while in the wider southeast of England it is up to almost 80 per cent.

Baroness Longfield, executive chairwoman of the Centre for Young Lives, said: "Progress is being made in boosting school attendance, but the numbers are still unacceptably high. All the evidence shows that missing school impacts on attainment and life chances, Children who are severely or persistently absent are inevitably at greater risk of missing out on important health interventions, including HPV jabs. The drop in uptake since Covid is extremely concerning, and a setback in the battle to eradicate cervical cancer by 2040."

The HPV vaccine was introduced in 2008 and is initially offered to 12 and 13 year-olds but school vaccination providers will also offer jabs to pupils aged up to 15 and 16.